Knicks fall to Wizards, 110-98 at the Garden, lose first preseason game

Frank Ntilikina was inserted in the starting lineup for the first time by Dave Fizdale and in the 18 minutes he spent on the floor he scored 10 points, shooting 4-7 from the field as the Knicks dropped their first game of the season, 110-98 at home to the Washington Wizards.

Alongside Ntilikina, Noah Vonleh also started last night. He failed to score and shot just 0-4 from the floor but grabbed 7 rebounds and blocked a couple.

Kevin Knox, however, continues to struggle. He shot 2-9 from the field last night and combined with the previous game he went 8-28 including 1-9 from behind the arc. Coach Fizdale understands what his rook is going through and addressed the situation saying that high draft picks always try to be perfect.

“They want to just please everybody and do everything right. And when you start playing like that you usually make mistakes. So just got to get him back into a reckless mode where he’s not worried about pleasing anybody or trying to be perfect.”

– David Fizdale

The Knicks led only for 90 seconds into the game and from that point on, New York stood behind Washington as the lead never changed until the final buzzer. They trailed by as many as 21 points in the third quarter after the Wizards entered the second half with a 19-6 run.

In spite of playing good third quarters so far, last night the Knicks collapsed and lost 36-25.

Bradley Beal scored 20 and Jeff Green added 16 for the Wizards, who won their first preseason game.

The Knicks were led by Tim Hardaway Jr. and Allonzo Trier off the bench, each scoring the 18 points. Trier shot 7-11 from the field and showed a lot of consistency, a good sign for such a young team. Iso Zo is averaging 15.8 points, and has a shooting percentage of over 54% from the field. And all this in 22.5 minutes per game.