--Coach Mike D'Antoni came away from the loss hoping he might have finally had a breakthrough with the rotation. It appears he will try to keep it to a very tight eight-man rotation -- possibly nine once C Eddy Curry returns from a knee injury -- and that means the team's two rookies, Toney Douglas and Jordan Hill, are likely out of the picture for now. Fans have been clamoring for D'Antoni to stop putting the focus on veterans such as Al Harrington, Chris Duhon and Larry Hughes and go with a youth movement this season. But D'Antoni believes the team's best chance to be competitive is to play the vets and hope they can work their way out of what has been an awful collective slump to start the season. --No one has struggled more than G Chris Duhon, who went into the game in Denver shooting 24.1 percent from the floor and 19.4 percent from three-point range. As the point guard in the pick-and-roll system, Duhon's poor shooting has caused teams to back off of him, which renders the pick-and-roll play useless, especially if he can't knock down shots that the other team is blatantly giving him.
D'Antoni admitted he was worried about Duhon, but remained firm on keeping him in the starting lineup mainly because "he's our best option" at the point guard position to run the offense. Nate Robinson can be an explosive scorer but is very erratic and not much of a playmaker and rookie Toney Douglas, at this point of his young career, appears to be primarily a scorer and not a facilitator who can run an offense.
Duhon knows the focus is on him as the offense struggles, especially with so many fans upset that the team opted not to sign Allen Iverson as a free agent.
"It's tough," Duhon said. "I think I just keep adding it on and keep piling it on each game. I think about it too much instead of just playing. It's just something I've got to get through. It's something new for me. But you've got to find a way."
He made 4-of-10 from the field, including 3-of-8 from three-point range, against the Nuggets, with six assists and zero turnovers in 37:04.
--With his 50-point performance, Carmelo Anthony joined fellow NBA elitists Kobe Bryant (61 on Feb. 2), Dwyane Wade (55 on April 13) and LeBron James (52 on Feb. 4), who have scored 50-plus points against the Knicks in the 2009 calendar year.
Before the game, Anthony was asked if he was ready to start the talk about 2011 if his buddy LeBron doesn't sign with the Knicks in 2010.
"Nooooo," he said with a laugh. "I ain't ready to start talking about that. That's two years from now."
Anthony has an opt-out after the 2010-11 season to become a free agent.
QUOTE TO NOTE: "Quite frankly, if their scorers had played that well over the first 15 games, they would probably be well over .500." -- Nuggets G Chauncey Billups on the Knicks.
Play Basketball Hot Streak and win prizes!
