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NEW YORK—Go on, all you Raptor fans who mocked coach Dwane Casey and his “pound the rock” mantra and rolled your eyes at the thought of some 1,300-pound boulder as some talisman for the season.

Make light if you will but in the aftermath of a rather impressive victory, a guy who’d struggled all season before playing a significant role in a 90-85 road win invoked the rock, the mantra and the importance of doing your job every day because good results may come at any time.

“There are no moral victories and for us to come through tonight was good because we’re a young team and it’s going to help us with our confidence and knowing we can win tough games by closing them out,” said Rasual Butler, who had 13 points and 10 rebounds in the victory.

“That’s why coach (Dwane) Casey and the coaching staff, we have this statement: Pound the rock. We know it’s going to take work, just like the statement says, it might be the 101st time that you finally crack the rock; you have to continue to work every day.”

Casey has tried to instill that kind of work ethic in a team that, so far this season, has responded with a consistently hard effort.

But before Monday night, they hadn’t had any tangible things to show for it.

They’d dropped three games in a row, blown good leads in the last two, and another group might have been in danger of throwing up their arms at the futility of it all and taking at least a night off.

But this team didn’t.

And when the Knicks made an inevitable run and carved an 18-point lead to one with just over a minute remaining, they found some inner reserve to make the right play and fight through the mental fatigue.

Andrea Bargnani made a clutch jumper in the low post to make it a three-point game and then matched a Knicks basket with two clutch free throws with 17.7 seconds left.

And after the Raptors forced Carmelo Anthony into badly missing a potential game-tying three with 13.2 seconds left, Anthony Carter sealed the game with two foul shots of his own.

“At halftime, we talked about that: they were going to make a run, we needed to keep our composure, make the easy plays,” said Casey. “We still had 18 turnovers, that’s way too many turnovers for us. Great win for us but we’ve got to learn from it and cut down on our turnovers.”

Bargnani finished with 21 points, the same as DeMar DeRozan, as the Raptors were finally rewarded with a win from a good night’s work.

“(Sunday) coach told us to stick with what we were doing,” said Bargnani. “Keep working, keep doing the same thing because it was working . . . we just had to finish the game.

“That’s what we did today, we finished the game. We played for 48 minutes and in the fourth quarter, we made really good decisions.”

Jose Calderon, with nine points and 12 assists, logged a season-high 43 minutes but calmed things down offensively late in the game when the Raptors needed it most.

Anthony led the Knicks with 35 points and Toney Douglas had 22.

The Raptors did have the benefit of catching a Knicks team with a barren bench and a distinct lack of offensive firepower.

Amar’e Stoudemire missed the game with a bad ankle, a knee injury has rookie Iman Shumpert on the inactive list, and Baron Davis is still weeks away from being able to even practise.

Stoudemire, who hurt the ankle on Thursday against the Lakers, said before the game that he could be back Wednesday night against the Charlotte Bobcats, but that there were no guarantees.

That means extended minutes for the likes of rookie Josh Harrellson, who was a nonfactor, and a thin bench that puts all kinds of pressure on the starters to play long minutes.

That’s all for today guys, i’ll be back to blog you tomorrow.

NEW YORK—Go on, all you Raptor fans who mocked coach Dwane Casey and his “pound the rock” mantra and rolled your eyes at the thought of some 1,300-pound boulder as some talisman for the season.

Make light if you will but in the aftermath of a rather impressive victory, a guy who’d struggled all season before playing a significant role in a 90-85 road win invoked the rock, the mantra and the importance of doing your job every day because good results may come at any time.

“There are no moral victories and for us to come through tonight was good because we’re a young team and it’s going to help us with our confidence and knowing we can win tough games by closing them out,” said Rasual Butler, who had 13 points and 10 rebounds in the victory.

“That’s why coach (Dwane) Casey and the coaching staff, we have this statement: Pound the rock. We know it’s going to take work, just like the statement says, it might be the 101st time that you finally crack the rock; you have to continue to work every day.”

Casey has tried to instill that kind of work ethic in a team that, so far this season, has responded with a consistently hard effort.

But before Monday night, they hadn’t had any tangible things to show for it.

They’d dropped three games in a row, blown good leads in the last two, and another group might have been in danger of throwing up their arms at the futility of it all and taking at least a night off.

But this team didn’t.

And when the Knicks made an inevitable run and carved an 18-point lead to one with just over a minute remaining, they found some inner reserve to make the right play and fight through the mental fatigue.

Andrea Bargnani made a clutch jumper in the low post to make it a three-point game and then matched a Knicks basket with two clutch free throws with 17.7 seconds left.

And after the Raptors forced Carmelo Anthony into badly missing a potential game-tying three with 13.2 seconds left, Anthony Carter sealed the game with two foul shots of his own.

“At halftime, we talked about that: they were going to make a run, we needed to keep our composure, make the easy plays,” said Casey. “We still had 18 turnovers, that’s way too many turnovers for us. Great win for us but we’ve got to learn from it and cut down on our turnovers.”

Bargnani finished with 21 points, the same as DeMar DeRozan, as the Raptors were finally rewarded with a win from a good night’s work.

“(Sunday) coach told us to stick with what we were doing,” said Bargnani. “Keep working, keep doing the same thing because it was working . . . we just had to finish the game.

“That’s what we did today, we finished the game. We played for 48 minutes and in the fourth quarter, we made really good decisions.”

Jose Calderon, with nine points and 12 assists, logged a season-high 43 minutes but calmed things down offensively late in the game when the Raptors needed it most.

Anthony led the Knicks with 35 points and Toney Douglas had 22.

The Raptors did have the benefit of catching a Knicks team with a barren bench and a distinct lack of offensive firepower.

Amar’e Stoudemire missed the game with a bad ankle, a knee injury has rookie Iman Shumpert on the inactive list, and Baron Davis is still weeks away from being able to even practise.

Stoudemire, who hurt the ankle on Thursday against the Lakers, said before the game that he could be back Wednesday night against the Charlotte Bobcats, but that there were no guarantees.

That means extended minutes for the likes of rookie Josh Harrellson, who was a nonfactor, and a thin bench that puts all kinds of pressure on the starters to play long minutes.

Comment Below!.

The Knicks’ poor first-half effort gave Toronto another big lead.

Then their poor final-minute execution allowed the Raptors to keep this one.

Andrea Bargnani and DeMar DeRozan each scored 21 points, and the Raptors held onto a big cushion this time, beating New York 90-85 on Monday night.

Jose Calderon added nine points and 12 assists for the Raptors, who blew a 16-point lead Sunday in Orlando before losing 102-96. They opened a 17-point advantage at halftime in this one thanks to the Knicks’ inept second quarter then held on to snap a three-game losing streak.

“We didn’t let their run get to us,” DeRozan said. “The last couple of games you know teams made runs on us and we let it get to us and we kind of broke down on the defensive end. So tonight we didn’t let that happen.”

Carmelo Anthony had 35 points and 11 rebounds as the Knicks played their second straight game without Amare Stoudemire, who has a sprained left ankle. But they couldn’t duplicate their impressive play from their victory without him on Saturday in Sacramento, shooting just 36 per cent from the field and misfiring on 25 of their 35 three-point attempts.

Toney Douglas had 22 points for the Knicks, 12 during a third quarter that finally woke them up after a dreadful second period in which they made three baskets. But he appeared to forget the play when the Knicks inbounded down three in the final seconds, forcing Anthony to launch a long-range attempt that missed with 13 seconds left.

Coach Mike D’Antoni was all the way on the court hollering for Douglas to move before the ball was thrown in, and he said after the game the Knicks forgot the play that was to be run.

“I thought the whole first half our energy was down. We didn’t play real hard. And then I think we got a little snake bitten in the sense of when you’re not playing hard, things aren’t falling, it started being contagious and everybody started missing shots, and we were playing on our heels,” D’Antoni said. “Halftime we talked about it and we came out and played aggressive and I thought second half was really good, but we needed obviously 48 minutes and didn’t get it.”

Missing a chance

The Raptors missed a chance to extend a three-point lead in the final 90 seconds when Amir Johnson blew a dunk, and Anthony followed with a drive into the lane to cut it to 84-83 with 1:04 to go. Bargnani answered with a jumper, and after Tyson Chandler’s dunk, Bargnani sank a pair of free throws to keep it at a three-point edge with 17 seconds left.

Anthony missed the three-point attempt and Anthony Carter, who finished last season with the Knicks, hit two free throws to make it 90-85 with 10.7 seconds remaining.

Rasual Butler had 13 points and 10 rebounds for Toronto.

“A little bit different than last night,” Raptors coach Dwane Casey said. “They made the run. We knew they were going to make a run. Our guys bounced back, hung in there, took the blow and absorbed it.”

Stoudemire could be back Wednesday against the Bobcats, and Iman Shumpert could return this week, ahead of the two to four week absence that was expected when he sprained a right knee ligament in the Christmas opener.

The Knicks showed how badly they could have used his help in the first half.

New York led 23-22 after one, but then shot 3 of 19 (16 per cent) in the second quarter. They heard some boos at Madison Square Garden, where the loudest cheers came when receiver Victor Cruz of the playoff-bound Giants was shown in his courtside seat.

The Knicks didn’t monopolize the ugliness — Toronto’s Jamaal Magloire threw up an airball on a free throw. But Toronto shot 56 per cent in the second quarter and ran off seven straight during one Knicks drought to open a 17-point lead before taking a 51-34 advantage into halftime.

“Second half we played with a lot more confidence,” Anthony said. “First half, I really don’t know what was wrong with us. No excuses, but I think, I know, in the second half we did a better job defensively. Offensively guys made shots.”

DeRozan hit a three-pointer to open Toronto’s second-half scoring, but the Knicks surged back behind Douglas, who had a four-point play among his 12 points in the period as New York got within three before Toronto took a 67-58 lead into the final period.

Rookie Josh Harrellson, who had 14 points and 12 rebounds as Stoudemire’s replacement Saturday, was limited to two points and five boards. Chandler finished with 11 points and 10 rebounds.

Gotta run!.

The lesson to learn from Monday night’s game (Jan. 2) is that if you live by the three-pointer, you also die by the three-pointer. The New York Knicks attempted 35 three-pointers against the Toronto Raptors, making just 10 of them to finish 28.6 percent from beyond the arc. Overall, the team went just 28-for-78 from the field (35.9 percent) in a game that simply got away from them at the end.

This 90-85 loss to the Raptors is extremely frustrating; especially with how good the Knicks looked against the Sacramento Kings back on Saturday (Dec. 31). The team had to play without All-Star power forward Amare Stoudemire again, and at first it didn’t seem like it would hurt the team. The Knicks took a nice 23-22 lead at the end of the first quarter and it looked like a great game was brewing. The second quarter got out of control though, as Toronto out-scored the Knicks 29-11 in those 12 minutes alone.

Heading into halftime with a 17-point deficit to a team that won 22 games last year is not what Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni wanted to see, and at least the team put in more effort in the second half. The Knicks fought back to within one point with just 35 second left but couldn’t stop the Raptors when it mattered most. In the early Atlantic division standings, New York now falls behind Toronto by means of the head-to-head tie-breaker. This is definitely not where the team wanted to sit after five games in a shortened season.

Carmelo Anthony finished the game 13-for-31 from the field, often taking shots he wasn’t comfortable with just to get the offense going. Far too many times there were other players passing up shot opportunities and it seemed like Bill Walker was afraid to even take shots on Monday night (Jan. 2). I don’t blame Anthony at all for attempting 31 shots, but I would have liked him to make a couple more. He did finish with 35 points, 11 rebounds and 4 assists though, so fantasy basketball owners that have him had to come away happy from this game.

Next up for the 2-3 Knicks are the Charlotte Bobcats, who come to town on Wednesday (Jan. 4) for a 7:30 p.m. ET game.

More From YCN :

Knicks Beat Kings Without Stoudemire

Stoudemire Injures Ankle

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Sources:

Full Knicks Schedule

New York Knicks Website

*Ryan Christopher DeVault is a fan of the New York Knicks that has followed the team since the days John Starks, Charles Oakley, and Anthony Mason instilled their defensive will on the rest of the league.

Note: This article was written by a Yahoo! contributor. Sign up here to start publishing your own sports content.

Not much else going on in the NBA world today.

New York Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni likes the direction his offence is heading. Even if Amar’e Stoudemire isn’t on the court demanding defensive attention.

The Knicks hope to have Stoudemire back as they try to build on their best offensive performance of the season Monday night against the struggling Toronto Raptors at Madison Square Garden (7:30 p.m. ET).

Stoudemire, who is averaging 17.3 points and 6.0 rebounds in three games, is listed as day-to-day with a sprained left ankle. The six-time All-Star didn’t dress Saturday against Sacramento, but that didn’t seem to have much of an effect on New York’s offense.

All five starters had 14 points or more for the Knicks (2-2) in an easy 114-92 win. Carmelo Anthony led the way with 23 points, while Stoudemire’s replacement, rookie Josh Harrellson, finished with 14 points and 12 rebounds for New York, which had averaged 80.0 points on 35.8 per cent shooting in losing its previous two games.

“Our team is starting to pick up things in the offence that if we continue to do it, we can be successful,” D’Antoni said. “When you have a Carmelo with an Amar’e, it tends to open the floor even more. When the ball moves, our younger guys can get more involved.”

The Knicks finished with season highs of 26 assists and 46 points in the paint.

“When the ball is moving like that, you can see how successful we can be offensively,” Landry Fields said. “It’s a very nice win. Hopefully it brings us momentum going into our next game.”

New York had no trouble offensively against Toronto last season, averaging 114.5 points in sweeping the four-game series. Stoudemire averaged 26.8 points and 11.5 boards against the Raptors in 2010-11, while Anthony had 23 points and nine rebounds in the lone game he played in last season’s series, a 131-118 win at MSG on April 5.

The Raptors (1-3) were 26th in scoring defence last season (105.4), and although they’ve been more sound defensively in 2011-12, yielding an average of 96.8 points, it hasn’t translated to many wins.

Toronto’s defense played well through three quarters Sunday in Orlando but didn’t get many stops down the stretch. The Raptors led by as many as 13 in the fourth, but the Magic shot 70.6 per cent (12 for 17) in the final period to rally for a 102-96 win. It was the second consecutive second-half collapse by Toronto, which squandered a seven-point, third-quarter lead in Friday’s 99-86 loss to Dallas.

“I don’t really have an explanation as to why this game got away,” said Jose Calderon, who had 18 points and 13 assists. “It’s tough. It’s kind of like the same thing that happened with Dallas. They’re two veteran teams. They know how to play in those moments. We’ve got to learn from that.”

Andrea Bargnani paced the Raptors with 28 points Sunday, but only scored three in the fourth quarter. The 7-foot Italian, who is averaging 26.3 points on 53.6 percent shooting in his last three games, had a career-high 41 points in a 113-110 loss at MSG last December.

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NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – Despite two losses in two days on the West Coast, Knicks fans do have a little something to cheer about here at home – if they’ve got a sweet tooth.

Magnolia Bakery is celebrating the return of the NBA with New York Knicks-themed cupcakes.

The sweets first became available at select locations on Christmas Day to coincide with the Knicks’ 106-104 victory over the Celtics.

Photos: Knicks Defeat Celtics In Christmas Day Thriller

“This is the first year that we’ve introduced Knicks cupcakes,” a representative from the bakery told CBSNewYork. “So far, the fans really seem to enjoy them.”

Related: The 5 Best Bars To Watch A Knicks Game

The cupcakes ($3.25 each) will only be available in the bakery for home games.

But if you’re looking to cater your gamewatch with something other than beer and pretzels, fans can pre-order the treats throughout the season at any time.

The store is also offering Bulls and Lakers cupcakes at our respective Chicago and L.A. locations.

That’s all for today.