On March 23, the Knicks welcomed the Boston Celtics at home. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

The Celtics didn't start the season well, but after trading Antoine Walker, who was once known as the Celtics' "twin star" with Paul Pearce, in the middle of the season, their record gradually improved, and they are now third in the East.

The Knicks, who have only won four games less, are ranked eighth in the East, and their position is still a little unstable.

This season, in addition to the Miami Heat and Detroit Pistons, the two teams in the East are far ahead, and the nine teams, including the Knicks, have relatively close records, and the form of the playoffs is still unclear.

The form of the West is a little clearer, with the Phoenix Suns, San Antonio Spurs, Dallas Mavericks and Seattle SuperSonics all leading the way, the Houston Rockets and Sacramento Kings entering the playoffs more securely, and only three or four teams qualified for the final two spots.

However, although the Celtics are stronger now, the Knicks are not without a hard fight.

The Celtics have a good scoring ability on the inside, but their defensive ability is worse than before the trade, and Antoine Walker's defense at the No. 4 position has always been a soft underbelly, and this is the Knicks' opportunity.

In this game, Kurt Thomas was out of the game due to his body, and the only player who could play center could not play, and he thought that the start would be difficult, but he didn't expect Crawford to hit consecutive three-pointers, and the Knicks took the lead at the beginning of the game.

Tim Thomas didn't defend well, and Antoine Walker almost kept shooting from distance, but his accuracy was not very good, and it dragged down the Celtics a bit.

This is also the reason why the Celtics sent him away in the first place, his style of play is not suitable to be the core of the team, but this time back, Antoine Walker instinctively thinks that it is still the same as before, and he doesn't care about the shot, it is good when it is good, and it is bad when it is bad.

After playing for a few minutes, Pierce didn't catch the ball like this, and was taken care of by Lehi's hand-to-hand defense, and his mood suddenly became very unhappy.

Pierce is also a player with a lot of strength in the small forward position, and when it comes to attacking, Lehi will not resist the opponent hard, and after receiving the ball, he will directly use his speed to burst Pierce.

Pierce was squeezed to the side by Lehi's change of direction, and cut it with one palm, hitting Lehi's arm from top to bottom, and the referee's whistle sounded in time.

Then when the Celtics attacked, Pierce got the ball and rushed head-on towards Lehi.

Seeing that Lehi was not out of position, Pierce turned around and sat down towards Lehi, and when he squeezed inside, he made two consecutive turning feints, which were different when he was usually beaten by the back, and Pierce was squeezing in while making a feint.

After two or three consecutive hits, Pierce was near the three-second zone, and the assistant defender under the basket rushed over, and Pierce completely leaned on Lehi to complete the turn, and picked the basketball into the basket from under Lehi's arm.

This seemingly complicated offensive tactic was smooth in the hands of Pierce, and without getting rid of the defenders and not jumping too high, he completely got rid of Lehi's interference and scored two points.

This excites Lehi, who enjoys the feeling of confrontation.

In the attack, he ran more diligently, Pierce's speed was not very fast, Lehi must use his strengths, he received the ball again and relied on his speed to force a breakthrough.

Pierce judged Lehi's path this time and moved ahead of Lehi ahead of him.

Seeing that he was about to hit it, Lehi braked suddenly, leaned forward and raised his arm up to shoot.

I feel a lot of burden on my knees, and my usual physical training and youthfulness are reflected here.

Lehi made a pull-up jumper, and Pierce's arm didn't have time to retract and fouled again.

Lehi hit both free throws, but Pierce was replaced early due to foul issues.

Ricky Davis, who replaced him, was also a ruthless character, and he was the boss before the Cavaliers drafted James, but he didn't have a good time after trading to the Celtics, and he had no problem cutting points, but the player was unwilling to start him, and he was the kind of player who was more difficult to integrate into the tactical system.

He came up to attack Lehi, and as a result, he also continued to strike iron under continuous interference.

In the first quarter, the Knicks led by nine points, thanks to Crawford's three-pointers on 4-of-4 shooting.

In the second quarter, the Celtics, who entered the rotation, played with vitality, and several of their rookies this year were good, and the bench was very strong.

However, the characteristics of the offense and defense were problematic, and Lehi scored 10 straight points when he took the team off the bench to further extend the Knicks' lead.

By the second half, the Celtics were a little frustrated.

In the absence of Kurt Thomas, Marrick Rose and Morris Taylor turned out to be decent and energetic, keeping the Knicks at the top of the rebounding curve.

At 107:82, the game was won relatively easily, and the team management also had some thoughts about Kurt Thomas.

Kurt Thomas's state was a little sluggish after switching to the No. 5 position, and the conflict with Marbury has never been resolved, unlike young players like Lehi, neither of the two plans to take the initiative to bow their heads, and they have not communicated much.

Kurt Thomas returned to the team in the next back-to-back away games, but the team started a losing streak.

First against the SuperSonics, Ray Allen cut a 40+10 whistle three-pointer to drag the Knicks into overtime, and after the start of overtime, Lehi took the initiative to defend Thunder Allen, but Lewis faced Tim Thomas with consecutive hits, and Lehi was depressed.

Then when they played back-to-back games against the Trail Blazers, the interior line was blown up again and suffered a losing streak.

By playing against the Warriors, Troy Murphy played 20+20 data, and Byron Davis, who became the starter, made a big move, and the Knicks lost again.

In the last game of March, the Knicks played the Lakers on the road.

In this game, the Knicks' defense was a mess, and Lehi was in a slump, trapped in foul scoring and did not get a double-double.

Originally, he was very much looking forward to defending Kobe Bryant again, but unfortunately he would be defeated by the opponent if he didn't do a good job on the court, and before he could defend Kobe, he was fouled by Butler and brought off the court.

With just a dozen games left in the regular season, the Knicks dropped out of the top eight in the East.

During the next day's practice, Lehi exploded into foul language due to the team's defensive problems, causing several teammates to be unhappy.

I don't know how the media reporter heard the news of this matter, and immediately turned up the old accounts of Lehi and Marbury's disagreement and stirred it up.

The players played big names, caused conflicts, and caused the coach to resign, but the Knicks really couldn't do it, and the media looked like they were afraid that the world would not be chaotic.