French rook’s health top priority
The biggest problem for the Knicks regarding rookie point guard Frank Ntilikina simply has been getting him on the floor.
It won’t happen Tuesday night in Boston, either.
Ntilikina, who missed summer league with a sore knee, all but one preseason game with a bruised knee then sat the second game of the regular season with a sprained ankle, will be out against the Celtics, coach Jeff Hornacek said Monday. Ntilikina was a virtual inactive at practice because of the ankle.
“He did the shooting part of it but didn’t do any live stuff,” Hornacek said. “I don’t think he’ll be out there [Tuesday].”
Ntilikina, the eighth pick in the draft, is a key component of the Knicks’ rebuild, targeted for point guard, a supremely important spot in the modern NBA. The Knicks could be reminded of that, perhaps painfully, in Boston by Kyrie Irving.
“You have to look at the league and how a lot of teams are going smaller,” Hornacek said. “It’s the penetration and getting the floor spread. When you have a point guard like Kyrie, who can do that, then the other guys are free to cut and move. Penetration is big in this league, whether you get it through a pass or a dribble, but a lot of these point guards in the league can break you down.” And cause havoc. “It’s a total team defense that you have to have against these guys,” Hornacek said.
Knicks point guard Ramon Sessions should get first crack at Irving. He knows what awaits.
“He’s one of those guys with [what] I call an ‘old man’ type of game, change paces real well,” Sessions said. “One of those guys who can lull you to sleep because he’s not super fast. But he’s quick with the ball. Can handle the ball, probably top one or two guys in the league who can handle the ball. He can shoot, can drive, can pass, can do a lot of different things. He’s a new generation scoring guard. Like a Steph Curry. A guy that cannot necessarily just run an offense, a guy that can put up 30. So he’s a guy that’s very dangerous. It takes all five guys to contain a guy like that.”