Knicks 116, Nets 111: Scenes from a silly preseason finale

I coulda sworn I saw people say this final preseason game was meant to be a dress rehearsal of sorts, an actual rotation. It was not that, but it was an okay game of basketball nonetheless. A few things to look at:

Joakim Noah did most of his playing in the first quarter, and got some buuuuuuuuckets during that time. Mostly stuff like this, but also a baseline jumper in there, too:

... plus all the passing and screening you know and love:

He had a few later stretches of over-ambitious passing, but that first quarter was very cool and encouraging.

Cool buzzer-beater from Courtney Lee, who I swear is just always in the right place doing something solid:

Even cooler angle:

But yeah, more than all that, Lee has a knack for just being in the right spot. When the Knicks move the ball well, he’s usually there waiting for an easy corner three.

Melo’s been a little stiff in preseason (not alarmingly so, just rust), so it was nice to see him get a little loose in secondary transition and off the catch:

Brandon Jennings is 120% Brandon Jennings whether the games count or not:

O’Quinn straight-up fuckin’ tackled a dude:

Things I meant to make some Vines of, but then I changed the channel to Sparks-Lynx and forgot:

• Kyle O’Quinn (who looked nice and relaxed and didn’t hold the ball forever on offense) hitting a cutting Jennings with a g0000rgeous backdoor pass.
• Ron Baker finished the game with a couple slick slick passes to cutting teammates. Been impressed with his creativity off the dribble in a way I wasn’t during Summer League. Such creativity is important, because his legs don’t give him much.

The Knicks look far from figuring out who they are and what they want to do in the regular season, but whatever. Let’s play some basketball games.