NEW YORK — Carmelo Anthony remains out for tonight’s game against Jeremy Lin and the Houston Rockets, but could return Wednesday against Brooklyn at Madison Square Garden.
The Knicks other superstar, Amar’e Stoudemire, has been cleared to practice and will do so with the Knicks’ D-League team, the Erie BayHawks, on Tuesday and Thursday. Stoudemire could potentially make his season debut Friday against Chicago or Sunday against Minnesota.
“He’s been cleared, and again the practices have to go kind of in his favor,” coach Mike Woodson said of Stoudemire who has been out all season after having a knee procedure that was originally said to sideline him 6-8 weeks. “I don’t want him coming to me after tomorrow’s practice and saying, ‘Coach, I’m hurt and I’m sore.’ Then we gotta evaluate it and still take it a day at a time. I’m not going to rush him back. He’s gotta be ready and I’m gonna lean on him to tell me when he’s ready to go.”
He added: “I just want to make sure he gets out of the practice not hurt.”
Woodson said the BayHawks would be in New York Tuesday and Wednesday and possibly Thursday.
“He will practice with the D-League team [Tuesday],” Woodson said. “Our next scheduled practice will be Thursday, and I think the D-League team will still be in town. I know tomorrow and Wednesday they’ll be in but that’s game day [Wednesday]. So Thursday will probably will be a second practice for him. And then if the D-League team stays, he’ll practice with them again and then we’ll see where he is.”
Meantime, Anthony, the NBA’s second-leading scorer, declared himself unable to play for a second straight game with a sprained left ankle suffered last Thursday against the Lakers. He could return Wednesday when the Knicks host the Nets for the first time since the team moved to Brooklyn. Chris Copeland will start in Anthony’s place.
“[Anthony] made the decision in film session this morning and we just gotta wait him out,” Woodson said.
“He won’t play tonight and we’ll evaluate him again tomorrow when we get to practice and see where he is. Hopefully he’ll be ready Wednesday, we just don’t know at this point.”
Rasheed Wallace and Marcus Camby remain out for the Knicks with sore left feet.
“When we can get some healthy bodies back and get back out on the practice floor,” Woodson said, “we can start drilling some more defensively and get our rotations down a little bit better.”
