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GREENBURGH, N.Y. — Despite failing to reach their goal of making the Eastern Conference Finals, Carmelo Anthony believes the Knicks are “right there” going forward.
“We right there, I mean we right there,” Anthony said Monday following the Knicks’ season-ending loss at Indiana in Game 6 Saturday night.
“When you recap this whole season, it’s just some detail-oriented things that we kind of gotta fix. But we right there. I believe we right there as a team, as a unit, the guys that we have on this team, we right there. I’m a believer in that, I’m very confident.”
His teammate, Iman Shumpert, gave the most blunt assessment of the Knicks’ postseason failure to get past Indiana in the conference semifinals.
“We know we were supposed to go farther,” Shumpert said. “We didn’t. So it’s a failure.”
Shumpert made the point that the Knicks need to hold each other accountable for their failures, and Anthony conceded on that point.
“Shump is right,” Anthony said. “There’s times when we need to hold each other accountable.”
Next year the Knicks will have to contend not only with LeBron James and the Miami Heat but also with several Eastern Conference teams that expect to have injured stars back. Chicago’s Derrick Rose, Indiana’s Danny Granger and Boston’s Rajon Rondo are all expected back.
Things could get harder for the Knicks going forward, yet the team’s collective message seems to be that this is Year 1 of a process
“I don’t think we underachieved,” Anthony said. “We dealt with the season the way we dealt with it. We made strides forward. We made huge steps. When I first got here in New York, I always said this was a process, this was going to take two to three years, and this was the first year the pieces to the puzzle started to fall into place.
“So we only going to get better from here on out.”
Anthony can opt out of his contract after next season — and if the Knicks fail to achieve their goals he could be inclined to do so — but said that’s not on his mind right now.
“I can’t think about that right now,” he said. “That would be selfish on my part to sit back and think about a situation like that, think about something like that. When that time comes I’ll deal with it. Right now, it’s all about getting better myself, as a team and moving forward.”
Anthony confirmed a Daily News report that he will have his left shoulder examined this week. He called his shoulder “stable” and said “it’s just a matter of right now just rest and letting it heal on its own.”
“It was bothering me since it happened,” Anthony said. “To be able to play with that and get through that pain, it just came a point where you just try not to think about it.”
It remains unclear what the future holds for several Knicks, including Jason Kidd, 40, and Marcus Camby, 39 — both of whom are signed for two more years — as well as J.R. Smith, who has a player option for next season but has said he wants to retire as a Knick.
Anthony said he wanted Smith back next season despite his tumultuous postseason.
“Without a doubt, without a doubt,” Anthony said. “J.R.’s a special player and to me and everybody on this team, he’s made a huge step forward as a basketball player and we look forward to that, for him to come out and be focused the way he’s focused this season. Win the Sixth Man of the Year award, help us to win another division title, helping us to 50-plus games, he’s a big piece to this team. I definitely would love him back here.”
Still, Anthony said that he wouldn’t actively offer advice to Knicks GM Glen Grunwald and head coach Mike Woodson. Grunwald and Woodson are expected to meet with the media on Tuesday.
“As far as me making decisions or anything like that I leave that up to the front office,” Anthony said. “If they want my input they know how to get in contact with me…But i leave that up to them. That’s what they do, that’s what they get paid for.”
Neither Smith nor Amar’e Stoudemire spoke with the media Monday, but Anthony says he hopes Stoudemire can recover fully from two knee surgeries this year. Stoudemire was relegated to the bench in the second half of Game 6, and averaged just 3.8 points and 2.3 rebounds in the postseason.
“Coming from more of a friend than a teammates for Amar’e, I would love to see him get back 100 percent healthy,” Anthony said.
“I don’t think anybody that plays sports is 100 percent healthy. But to get back as healthy as he can be and kind of be injury free. As a friend it’s hard for me to sit back and watch somebody that I wanted to come in and play with go through some of the things, the ups and downs, the hurdles that he had to leap and the injuries that he had to go through and still not be as strong as he could be.
“As a friend and as his guy I would want him to be as healthy as he can be, do whatever it takes to get back healthy. As far as being in shape, he came back in shape. He put a lot of effort into it .. things that you guys probably didn’t sees, we saw him in the gym every day two, three times a day … There’s just some injuries that you can’t overcome and at this point I just want him to be completely healthy before he starts thinking about anything.”
The Knicks had their best success this year with Anthony as the starting power forward in a small lineup. When healthy, Stoudemire came off the bench but he and Anthony rarely played together since both play the same position.
“I’m pretty sure Coach Woodson and his staff with evaluate that,” Anthony said. “We did have a lot of success with me playing at power forward position. But I mean, whatever has to happen has to happen. If I have to play four again next year, then I’ll do it.
“But right now we as a team and myself, we set a standard, we kind of teased the city of New York a little bit. Because now everybody expects us to play at this level, this high level, that’s where we hold ourselves accountable and push ourselves in this offeseason to come back and be at that level or even better.”
The goal remains a championship, even it figures to get still harder next year in a deeper Eastern Conference.
“Eventually something has to happen,” he said. “We want to win the championship, that’s the goal, and we’re going to keep striving for that.”
