Carmelo Anthony drops 39 points to halt New York Knicks’ slide

Carmelo Anthony leads Knicks over Magic

Carmelo Anthony was not about to let his new team lose ground in the playoff standings and it showed last night at Madison Square Garden.

Anthony scored 39 points to lead the New York Knicks to a 113-106 overtime win over the visiting Orlando Magic. He described the game against one of the top teams in the NBA as "almost a must win for us."

The Knicks had lost nine of their last ten games and had to win this one to maintain the seventh spot in the current playoff seeding. The Charlotte Bobcats, Philadelphia 76ers and Milwaukee Bucks are all jockeying for position for the eight and last spot as the regular season winds down.

"We had a will to win," said Carmelo Anthony, who was traded before the February deadline from the Denver Nuggets to his hometown. "We wanted it bad enough tonight. We went out and got it. We knew we would get out of the hole of this losing streak."

Jason Richardson of the Orlando Magic hit a three-point shot with five seconds remaining in regulation to force overtime with the score tied at 100 apiece.

But the visitors were outscored by the Knicks 10-2 to finish the overtime period. Orlando was led by Dwight Howard who scored 29 points and 18 boards, but was whistled for a technical foul late in overtime. Chauncey Billups, who came with Carmelo Anthony from Denver in the trade, hit the technical free throw to add to his 17 points and six assists.

Fans of the New York Knicks are relieved that their team finally got out of the slump. The Knicks are just 8-12 since the arrival of Carmelo Anthony.

Posted by Andre Monohan on Tuesday March 29 2011, 4:12 AM EDT. Ref: Bloomberg. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0