Just had to mention that Kevin Love of Cleveland broke a longtime NBA record tonight with 34 points...in the 1st quarter.

Yikes.

Finished the game with 40. Gotta love it.

James Harden is the man.

51 points, 13 boards, 13 assists for Houston tonight.

Just the 3rd guy in NBA history with 2 triple-doubles that featured 50 plus points in a season.

Damn.

As for the 76ers, Embiid had 32 points and is clearly one of the biggest young stars in the game already.

The Knicks. Ha ha ha

The thing is Melo has handled all this pretty well.

I like Melo and think Phil Jackson has screwed all this up. After all, Jackson is the one who gave Melo the no trade clause.

I think Melo hit the winning shot last night?

I agree, Phil Jackson has been a disaster.

The Knicks are a mess, but they aren't that bad and could make the playoffs.

The Eastern Conference is pretty terrible.

By the way I like ABC having Saturday Night games, and they've been very good ones.

It reminds me of the old days of Monday Night Football and Monday Night Baseball and the "Game of the Week" when you couldn't normally see these teams.

It will never be like that again due to over-saturation and cable.

It seems like the Knicks have been rebuilding for years and years. Time to blow it up again. Knicks will never be good again, too much pressure each season to have a decent team to fill up that Garden. They are incapable of starting from scratch and building through the draft.

The annoying thing is that they have never really tried to rebuild. They just continue to bring in "name" players so they will continue to sell out the Garden.
This includes, for this year, Noah & Rose, and before that Jackson himself. I think Dolan will be content as long as they continue to sell out, and if they actually win, that will be gravy.
I didn't like getting Anthony from the start, and while he has played well at times, overall it has not worked out. I hope he goes, and maybe that will be the start of something good.
Porzingas has not made any progress this year. He likely needs a different group around him.

Melo's main issue is that he's not LeBron. Why he's held to that status I'm not sure but he is one of the best pure scorers in the NBA and not a bad rebounder. I'm not in NY anymore but every time I see him he plays hard. He could play better D but I think that the NY media and fans ask him to do things that he doesn't do. If you have Carmelo Anthony, you should expect him to shoot the ball and play Iso ball. That's what he does and you'll get 25-30 points and 6-10 rebounds and he should play power foward.

Anthony needs to go, but teams know that, so the Knicks will get squat for him.

I wouldn't want him.

I agree the Knicks haven't rebuilt, they keep adding big names who fail and that will always set you back.

I despise what the 76ers did and how they did it, but man, with Embiid, Saric, Rodriguez, Okafor (whom they must trade), Noel, McConnell and Simmons coming back in February, the future looks very bright and this team will be for real for many years.

They did it by NBA rules which allow teams to tank and I was disgusted by it, but Embiid could end up the best player in the NBA, and soon.

It's amazing that in a sport where you only need 5 players and only 3 have to be real good that still teams cannot compete. That a NY franchise which should be one of the elites is let to stink this bad for so many years is almost criminal.

In their history, the Knicks have only been good for a few stretches. In the 60s and before Ewing they were woeful.

It also shows how hard it is to draft great players in the NBA. Really, if you don't have a top three pick the player you may be only OK. The Knicks were lucky with Kristaps and now have to build around him. If that means trading Melo, then trade him.

Well, let's be real here.

You need 8-9 true players to compete in the NBA.

Without a bench you're doomed.

When Golden State won 2 years ago, the Finals MVP was Iguodola who was a bench player that was incredible in the Championship Series.

Of course, NY doesn't even a bench either.

The Nets are the worst team in the NBA.

New York has become the dregs of the NBA, and that should never be.

But according to D-Rose they're a super team!

The Warriors put up 144 on the Clippers tonight.

Golden State is just incredible.

Let's see if they can win the title this year and not blow it in the Finals if they get there.

Ridiculous half court 3 by Curry to beat the buzzer. I know it's exaggerating, but the guy makes them feel routine.

In some alternate universe, the Hardin/Westbrook/Durant Thunder are on a 4 year championship dynasty and the rest of the NBA is crying about how unfair it is.

The NBA allows this kind of thing to happen (James leaving and recruiting to Miami, then going back to Cleveland and now Durant leaving OKC for Golden State, and the 76ers tanking to get Embiid, etc.)

They need to change so many things!

I don't know how they can change it all; we're not even at the all-star break yet, and as it stands, only 5 teams have a better than 1% chance of winning the championship; those 5 teams represent a 97.7% chance of who will be your champion (as per ESPN - CLE, TOR, GSW, SAN, HOU) and account for 10 of the 22 players selected to the all-star game. Sure, you need a deep team, and a bench, but without true stars buying in, you're toast.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/page/BP ... ayoff-odds

I do get why the NBA allows this to happen. If they didn't let teams buy their way to great rosters, a well managed club that lucks into a generational talent, like Golden State or San Antonio, can trounce the league for a decade, and that's while competing with the best money can buy. And while it might be good for ratings for it to be a showcase city to be that team, I think it's better for the league that it's smaller market teams that can do it, so that fans in small markets can have some hope. It's not always the LA, and NY, and Boston, and Miami buying their way to the top.