Bulls 110, Knicks 106: "Blown out by 4."

Oh well. I guess the Bulls are alongside the Rockets among the teams who just have the Knicks solved. Even with Carmelo Anthony around this time, New York played like stinky cat ass on both ends of the floor in their second meeting with Chicago. The rowdy, physical Bulls defense chewed and swallowed New York's pick-and-roll, leaving the Knicks to rely on Carmelo Anthony drives into traffic (nope), Raymond Felton pull-ups (noooooooope), whatever J.R. Smith could muster (semi-nope), and a whole wagonload of missed threes. The Knicks missed ten of their first eleven shots and fell behind 14-2, which isn't recommended. On the other end, the Knick defense got shook by the hot shooting of Luol Deng and Kirk Hinrich (?!!?!?), the aggressive foul-drawing of Marco Belinelli (!?!?!), and Joakim Noah's heedless persistence around the rim. They played uniformly shitty basketball.

On top of all that, this was an ornery, hideously officiated game and, as has been the case before, that environment got under the Knicks' skin and drove them (and eventually the Bulls) into a whiny, belligerent frenzy. And, uh...it got kinda awesome. The typically irascible Knicks lost J.R. to a foul-out, then Melo after he picked up two separate technicals for complaining, then Mike Woodson when he did the same in solidarity, then Tyson Chandler after he got into a little muggin' match with Joakim Noah (who also got ejected). That left a lineup of Felton, Pablo Prigioni, Jason Kidd, Steve Novak, and Chris Copeland (at the five I guess?) to attempt the zaniest comeback ever, and that group actually put a real, hilarious scare into the Bulls. Felton suddenly started driving (no Noah helped matters), and that hilarious three-point guard attack extended the game and actually cut it to four as time ran out. They scored 45 points in the fourth quarter after putting up that many in the first, like, thirty minutes of the game. That amounted to, as Edelorbe put it in the thread, a four-point blowout.

So, uh...I guess I should be mad that Felton's shot selection was so ghastly and that Woodson still let him stay on the floor and that the Knicks couldn't get Chandler the ball and that Melo went iso so often and that Ronnie Brewer and Steve Novak were useless in different ways and that New York's defense got shredded by a very bad offensive team, but...nahhhh. It would've been the absolute best if that five-guard comeback actually succeeded, but as is, the awful refereeing and unbridled chippiness rendered this game too delirious and bizarre to really upset me. If anything, I'm upset Herb Williams and a few more Knicks didn't get themselves tossed as well. I wish Sheed was healthy for this one. Composure is for the birds. LONG LIVE BEEF.