Maurice Taylor isn’t interested that the Knicks are without Stephon Marbury and Antonio Davis. All he cares about is that the Knicks have now lost five straight – the last two in especially ugly fashion.
“Nobody else is feeling sorry for us because Steph and Tony aren’t out there,” said Taylor, who had 12 points in the 109-98 loss to the Hornets at the Garden last night. “We can’t worry about that.”
The Knicks should be concerned, however, with how they have played in the absence of the injured Marbury and the suspended Davis. After Thursday night’s debacle against the Pistons, Larry Brown shifted his starting lineup once again.
Instead of rookies Channing Frye and Nate Robinson at the beginning, Brown opted for veterans Taylor and Quentin Richardson. The tinkering didn’t help much in the Knicks’ fifth straight defeat.
Rookie point guard Chris Paul torched the Knicks with 27 points, and while Marbury’s presence certainly would have helped, it was apparent that the Knicks had more problems than that.
“Honestly, we can’t use that excuse anymore,” said Frye. “We just have to suck it up and play harder.”
That was a disturbing theme that was heard around the discouraged Knicks’ locker room after the loss.
“We’ve got to go out and play with what we’ve got,” Jamal Crawford said. “There were times when we didn’t get back on defense, and that was disheartening, probably more than how we played.”
Taylor was even harsher.
“[New Orleans] came out with a lot of intensity and we didn’t match that,” Taylor said. “It’s not up to Steph and Antonio to bring that. It’s our responsibility to do that ourselves.”
Brown agreed.
“We didn’t have [Marbury] and we didn’t have Tony, but I don’t want to get into that,” Brown said. “We have players who are capable of doing enough out there.”
Perhaps, but they didn’t show it last night.
“You don’t realize how much you rely on someone like Stephon before he’s not out there,” Eddy Curry said. “It’s so much harder to do everything.”
Although Taylor agreed that the loss of Marbury and Davis hurt, he sounded much more critical of the team’s effort.
“We’ve got to come out with better intensity,” Taylor said. “We’re not that good to go down by 20 points and then come back. Good teams can do that. We’re not that good.”
And that’s true even with Marbury and Davis.
