Knicks Acknowledge Concerning Weak Spot

The New York Knicks, known for their defensive prowess, haven’t played up to their standards so far this season.

The Knicks rank 21st in defensive rating, and those struggles were put under a magnifying glass once again as the team fell to the struggling Utah Jazz on the road over the weekend.

Knicks forward Josh Hart is frustrated by the team’s defensive shortcomings and hopes to find a way to be part of a solution.

“We’ve been struggling on the defensive side for the whole season. When you’re not making shots and you’re not playing well defensively, that’s a recipe for disaster,” Hart said h/t Posting and Toasting. “We’ve got to figure it out on the defensive end. Offensively, we’ve got enough talent on the offensive side where, even if certain guys aren’t going that day, to play well and to win games. But we’ve got to figure it out defensively.”

The offense is definitely not the problem. The Knicks have the league’s second-best offensive rating behind the 17-1 Cleveland Cavaliers. New York should be close to that record, but a 9-7 mark through 16 games shows how poor the defense has actually been.

“It’s easy when you’re making shots—you can play defense. So we just gotta find a way when we’re missing,” Mikal Bridges said. “There’s gonna be them games. Just get through it.”

Last year, the Knicks ranked 9th in the NBA in defensive rating, and adding Karl-Anthony Towns and Bridges shouldn’t make the team regress that much. Sure, the team misses Isaiah Hartenstein, but that doesn’t mean the Knicks should be in the bottom third of the league in defense.

New York has to focus more on the defensive end of the floor in these upcoming games in order to work its way out of this slump.

Make sure you bookmark Knicks on SI for the latest news, exclusive interviews, film breakdowns and so much more!