The New York Knicks are still in search of their first win of the season and Monday may not be the day, it arrives with the New Orleans Hornets set to invade Madison Square Garden.
New York started the 2009-10 season with back-to-back road losses in Miami and Charlotte, then opened a four-game homestand with Saturday's 141-127 overtime loss versus the Atlantic Division-foe Philadelphia 76ers.
Al Harrington pumped in a career-high 42 points before fouling out in the extra period, while Danilo Gallinari buried 8-of-16 from behind the arc for 30 points in defeat. Larry Hughes scored 18 points for New York, which played its second straight overtime game and is off to its worst start since losing the first five contests of the 2005-06 season.
"Another night that we need to build on," Knicks head coach Mike D'Antoni said. "I know we're 0-3, I understand that. I understand two of them were overtime games. There was just some really good stuff. We're going to accentuate the positives, we're going to build on it. Obviously that means the first quarter."
The Knicks will also host Indiana and Cleveland on the residency. In team news, Harrington was fined $25,000 by the NBA for publicly criticizing game officials. The comments were made following New York's 102-100 double overtime loss to the Charlotte Bobcats on Friday.
New Orleans has dropped two of its first three games of the season, and is coming off Sunday's 97-87 setback to the Boston Celtics at TD Garden.
Peja Stojakovic led the Hornets with 26 points and Chris Paul contributed 22 points and eight assists in defeat. New Orleans, which entered the contest off a home win versus Sacramento, got 10 points from David West.
"Well, I don't know how good you can feel," Stojakovic said of his contribution. "It's still a loss. We tried I think we didn't have enough focus for 48 minutes. Some parts of the game were good for us from both ends of the floor. But we just didn't have enough consistency."
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