Against the Rockets (and some former Knicks), the Knicks ran out to a pretty big lead, but the Rockets were able to climb back in it.  Part of it was because the Rockets are a pretty good team, but the Knicks helped out big time.  The Knicks made a  couple of mental errors that lead to easy baskets for the Rockets:

Poor Outlet Passing

On two separate occasions, the Knicks turned the ball over in the backcourt.  The first comes after a Rockets three pointer:

Now, both J.R. Giddens and Chris Duhon are at fault here:

This is because Trevor Ariza is hanging around and it should have been noticed by either guy (or at least 1).  This is something that a lot of teams do to get the ball out of the PGs hands, but it rarely turns into a steal.  However, Giddens grabs the ball out of the net and just tosses to where Duhon is without looking.  For his part, Duhon floats away from the basketball as it comes to him instead of meeting the ball and ensuring the catch.  The Rockets went from being down 14 to being down 9 after this.  This was a huge 5 point swing in this game as the Knicks went from pulling away to trying to hang on to the lead.

This happened yet again later in the game, this time coming off of a missed basket:

Again, this is on both the passer (Bill Walker), and the man receiving the pass (Toney Douglas).  Douglas calls for the ball, and despite two Knicks being closer to him, Walker throws the pass.  Maybe a crisp pass gets there, but Walker kind of just lobs it up there.  Once again, the man receiving the pass floats away from it, and doesn’t meet the basketball, allowing for Kevin Martin to come in and get the steal.

I talked about the importance of outlet passing a little while ago, and you can see how important it is here.  The Knicks not gave up points with these poor outlet passes, but they also gave up possessions that they could have used to get points.  Now I don’t know if this was part of the Rockets’ game-plan, but they seemed to hang around the backcourt a little more than usual probably knowing that the Knicks want to run and will throw long outlet passes.  Either way the Knicks were way too loose with the basketball.

Not Boxing Out

We now move to the fourth quarter, where the Knicks lead is only 4 points.  The ball gets entered into Jordan Hill, who makes his move towards the basket.  Chris Duhon, who is covering Kyle Lowry, kind of just floats towards the basketball without worrying about his man, who is sprinting down the lane.  Hill misses his shot, and Lowry is right there for the rebound:

Not Getting Back On Defense

By my count, the Knicks have already given away 6 points to the Rockets and yet they are still up by 2 in the fourth quarter.  However, the Knicks are about to give the Rockets another easy bucket:

Danilo Gallinari pulls up for three with Chase Budinger closing out on him.  You have J.R. Giddens at the top of the key, with the responsibility to get back on defense, preventing any easy baskets.

After the shot goes up, Budinger just takes off towards his own basket.  Giddens, the man who is supposed to get back, sprints in to get the rebound.

As the ball makes its way to the rim, you can see the Knick farthest back is David Lee (at the elbow).  Meanwhile Budinger is still running towards his own basket.

The Rockets secure the rebound, and quickly outlet it out to Budinger, who finishes with the easy dunk.

Here it is in real time:

By my count, that is 8 “free points” that the Knicks just gave away due to mental errors and they still only lost by 4.  For the most part, the Knicks played well enough to get the win, but a few mistakes and it turned into a loss.