With about six and a half minutes left last night, Raymond Felton landed hard after leading a fast break that would end with a Landry Fields stuff-in that gave the Knicks a seven-point lead over the Bobcats. Felton got up holding his lower back, visibly in enough pain that for a moment it looked as if he might start crying. (He didn’t.) But in the closing seconds of the game, after the Knicks had let a fourteen-point lead dwindle to just one, it was Felton who sunk two free throws with 2.1 seconds left to seal the 110–107 victory against his former team.
And now a week after the Knicks extended their losing streak to six with a loss to Denver, they’re riding a four-game winning streak for the first time since last December. Toney Douglas (22 points) led a balanced attack that saw six Knicks score in double figures. Other top performers included Landry Fields (fourteen points, seven rebounds), Danilo Gallinari (who’s now made 43 consecutive free throws, one shy of Chris Duhon’s franchise record), and Ronny Turiaf (who finished with twelve points on six-for-six shooting, two blocks, and one display of sportsmanship, helping Gerald Wallace get up after knocking him to the floor, even as play continued on the other end of the court). Amar’e Stoudemire, meanwhile, finished with seventeen points and seven rebounds — but spent much of the fourth quarter in foul trouble after picking up his fifth with 9:06 remaining.
The Knicks, now a game under .500, play the Bobcats again tonight in Charlotte, in front of some 500 (!) of Felton’s friends and family members.