SHUMP HITTING SHELF
Iman should miss month; J.R. still iffy for tonight
THE KNICKS got a two-for-one deal on MRIs for their ailing shooting guards on Saturday, and the diagnoses for Iman Shumpert and J.R. Smith didn’t come with any big surprises.
The tests confirmed that Shumpert did dislocate his left shoulder during the Knicks’ slump-busting win Friday night in Boston, although surgery is not expected to be required. The former first-round pick is likely to miss at least a month, as the team said he will be reevaluated in three weeks.
Smith, who has missed the past two games with a sore left heel, has what the Knicks revealed is a small partial tear in the plantar fascia in his left foot. The 2013 NBA Sixth Man of the Year is listed as day-today and remains questionable for Sunday night’s home game against Toronto.
“I think I’m a pretty strong guy so hopefully all the weights I lifted this summer paid off and it will be a simple dislocation and I’ll be rehabbing it back,” Shumpert said after Friday’s game. “They said until they know off the MRI they can’t give me (a time frame).
“They know if they give it to me and I’m not back in that time, I’ll be a little (ticked) off.”
The Knicks didn’t practice on Saturday, but coach Derek Fisher and others said after they finally halted their 10game losing streak the previous night that others will have to raise their games in Shumpert’s extended absence.
“I thought guys stepped up big time (Friday) in place of Shump and we’re going to need that regardless if J.R. is playing, Shump is playing or I’m playing,” said Carmelo Anthony, who scored 22 points after missing Wednesday’s loss in San Antonio with nagging left-knee soreness. “We are going to need guys to step up.”
Tim Hardaway Jr., who added 16 points in Friday’s win, is the likeliest player to move into the starting lineup if Smith is unable to play against the firstplace Raptors.
Fisher also could employ more sets involving some combination of point guards Jose Calderon, Pablo Prigioni and Shane Larkin on the floor at the same time, as he did after Shumpert was helped to the locker room in serious pain late in the second quarter.
“I didn’t know what to think when I saw (Shumpert injured). I saw his shoulder come out of place and I was a little bit taken back by it,” Amar’e Stoudemire said. “I started grabbing my shoulder as if my shoulder was out of place. It was so devastating to see, another soldier down, but we gotta keep pushing, gotta keep working through these hiccups and keep trying to get wins.
“Even though we lost a lot of games in this stretch, we stayed together, we persevered, we talked it out … It’s a fresh start. We feel like now we can get that boulder off our back and try to play well and keep getting wins.”
Of course, the Knicks’ first victory since Nov. 22 doesn’t change the sobering fact that they still are 5-20 and have tied for the worst 25-game start in franchise history.
Of their remaining nine games in December, Sacramento (11-12) represents the only team that entered the weekend without a .500 record or better. Those looming opponents also began play Saturday with a combined 137-69 mark.
“It’s a challenge every night,” Stoudemire said. “We have to be willing to accept the competition. We gotta want to compete, we gotta embrace the challenge and go from there.”
Added Calderon: “Don’t get too high, it’s just one win … but hopefully it changes everything. I think once you get the confidence back, we can do it. We just gotta keep working. … We just gotta keep being a team, play together like we did (Friday) and hopefully the wins are going to come.”