Pours in 35 as Knicks

MIAMI — There was no LeBron James to stop Carmelo Anthony in Miami. The King is in New York waiting on the Knicks and avoiding Trump hotels.

There was no Dwyane Wade. No Chris Bosh. Not even Justise Winslow. The old Heat is gone, replaced by struggling youngsters with a starting shooting guard named Rodney McGruder (who?).

So nobody stopped Anthony on Tuesday night at American Airlines Arena. He went off for a season-high 35 points in a 114-103 victory, carrying the Knicks (12-9) to three games over .500 for the first time in the Phil Jackson era.

“I needed to get myself going,” Anthony said. “I knew that I wanted to get myself going, someway, somehow.”

The Knicks are the hottest team in the Eastern Conference with a four-game winning streak. They’ve also won nine of their last 12, just in time for the defending champions to invade the Garden tonight.

The Knicks figure to have a better showing than they did in the 17-point defeat in the season opener at Cleveland.

“I think we went into that game with just four practices total with all our guys, if that,” Jeff Hornacek said. That was the first time we played together. So hopefully we give them a better battle.”

Tuesday’s victory against the depleted Heat – which had just nine healthy bodies – tipped off a stretch that Hornacek described as potentially season-changing. It’s seven games with six on the road, and the coach set the bar for success.

“If we can come out of here at 5-2, it would be fantastic,” Hornacek said. “If we pulled something like that off, it might catapult us the rest of the year.”

That’s a lofty goal considering two of the opponents include Cleveland and Golden State. It would also buck a trend since the Knicks are 3-6 on the road.

But the recent play has the Knicks confident they turned a corner, or at least are rounding it. It helps that the Eastern Conference is again a jumbled mess after