Looked at another way, you have two interesting teams on small but meaningful streaks that are staking out an identity for themselves. The Bobcats have won two big road games against Miami and Cleveland after being mostly hopeless on the road for the first two months of the season, and are demonstrating an ability to win faster paced games as well as games played at their preferred low 90s/high 80s possession rate. Raymond Felton, Steven Jackson and Gerald Wallace are all playing very well  -- Felton has always played well against the Knicks (22.3 points, 7.3 assists, 6.7 rebounds in 3 games this year), and seems to be the biggest beneficiary of the arrival of SJax. According to Hollinger in his latest column examining under the radar performers, Felton is finally playing above league average for his position.

Jackson has been a subject of contention for his inefficient if occasionally spectacular play when he was at Golden State, but I cringed when the Bobcats acquired him for scraps because I knew he would do exactly what he's been doing for Larry Brown's team: making them tougher and more competitive. Apropos of nothing, the D'Antoni Knicks haven't yet beaten a team with a healthy Stephen Jackson playing (2 losses to the Warriors, a loss to the Bobcats). The lone win against the Bobcats came in mid-December with Jackson having to leave the game after a half with back spasms.

As for the Knicks, I made a mildly harsh proclamation at the end of a recent post describing them as the sort of team that would linger at six to eight games under .500 for the foreseeable future. They can do much better, of course, and the trends (with Nate Robinson back) point in that direction. At the very least, they seem to have worked out the severe spikes and dips in their focus and efficiency from game to game and have a more consistent commitment to defense and getting stops.

The next four games will be telling, though, to see if the Knicks can take that next step. I don't mean to discount the positive things about the team's resurgence in December, but much of it has been accomplished against teams the Knicks should have beaten (the most striking exception: two wins against the Hawks). When the Knicks faced challenges in December (road games against the Bulls and Bobcats, home games against the Heat and Spurs), they were competitive but couldn't quite pull off wins.

Tonight's game against Charlotte will be another manageable but deceptively difficult challenge. The Knicks should win, but they always seem to struggle to close this team out, and Charlotte has everyone healthy except for Tyson Chandler and has been playing their best basketball of the season. After tonight, there's a tough back-to-back with two of the most exciting teams in the West, the Rockets and Thunder, followed by a road game against the 76ers (who've played poorly this season but always match up well with the Knicks). If the Knicks end up splitting the next four games, I'll consider this stretch a success. 

Stat for the night coming into this game, courtesy of Hoopdata: David Lee is 30 of 47 on long jumpers (16-23 feet) in 8 of the last 9 games: his lone poor performance was missing 4 of 5 from the same distance in the Hawks game on New Year's Day. That's a remarkable 64% on long jumpers after shooting 39% from the same distance the first 21 games of the season. 

UPDATE: Al Harrington is out with a strained calf. For a team without frontline depth and still a little tenuous offensively, this could get interesting.