We knew the Knicks had to lose eventually.  At least the Knicks first loss was to the Grizzlies who are playing the best basketball in the league and now have the leagues best record as well.

Once again the energy was playoff atmosphere.  The effort on both ends was unbelievable.  Carmelo held his own for the most part guarding Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph and Rasheed Wallace looked like 2004 Rasheed.

Jerryd Bayless and JR Smith got into it late in the 2nd quarter and everything began to go downhill. 

Ed Malloy is the devil by the way.

This is the face of the devil

You might recognize Malloy as the guy who called about 73 technicals on the Knicks in game 1 of the playoffs last year as well as every shady Boston/Miami playoff game.  Tonight was more of the same.  JR had a flagrant called on him for grabbing Tony Allens arm, Rasheed Wallace received a technical for running away after a cheap foul was called on him, Woodson had a technical, didn’t see what he did, and Melo and Chandler were in foul trouble the whole 2nd half.  The final foul count was almost even, but it never felt that way.  There were a number of times Melo’s headband somehow ended up halfway down his face without fouls being called.  I’m not saying this is why the Knicks lost, they went cold for a while and they couldn’t stop Memphis who shot great, but the refs shouldn’t be a factor at all and they were.  It was the same formula as last years playoffs, make all the bad calls earlier in the game and call the 4th quarter evenly when the game is already out of hand.

The Knicks did come from 21 back to pull to within 8 and the way this season was going I half expected them to pull it out, but every time the Knicks scored Memphis would come right back.  The Grizzlies hit a bunch of shots in the 4th that couldn’t have been guarded any better.

We all knew the first loss would come eventually and the next game is against the struggling Pacers so hopefully this was just a minor bump in the road and the Knicks can get back to their winning ways on Sunday.