New York @ Toronto preview

Last Meeting ( Mar 28, 2019 ) Toronto 117, New York 92

The New York Knicks know they need to turn their season around quickly and earning a road win over a top team would be a big step in the right direction. The Knicks will try to snap a three-game slide when they begin a stretch of four straight against top teams from the Eastern Conference by visiting the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday.

New York, which faces Philadelphia, Boston and Milwaukee over its next three games after finishing up with the Raptors, dropped its last three games by single digits and is focused on making the small improvements that will push the team into the win column. "One thing about it, you've got to just continue to work," Knicks coach David Fizdale told reporters. "The moment you just let down; nobody is going to feel sorry for you. You've got to continue to get better. Everybody in this locker room is optimistic. Everybody is always smiling. Everybody is eager to do better, eager to do more. Just got to keep pushing." New York could have a hard time finding points against the Raptors, who are winners of four straight games and held three of those four opponents under 100 points. Toronto held Philadelphia superstar Joel Embiid scoreless in a 101-96 victory over on Monday and leads the NBA in field-goal percentage defense (41.3).

TV: 7:30 p.m. ET, MSG (New York), TSN (Toronto)

ABOUT THE KNICKS (4-13): Fizdale referred to swingman Wayne Ellington while looking for evidence that his team can turn it around, since Ellington was a member of the 2016-17 Miami squad that started the season 11-30 and finished 30-11. "Yeah, listen, it takes a lot of character to make a flip like that," Ellington told Newsday. "I think we've got that in this locker room. We've got the guys for it. We've got the guys that are hard-nosed, guys that aren't going to quit, guys that aren't going to roll over, guys that are going to block out all the outside noise. That's what it takes." One of those hard-nosed guys is forward Marcus Morris Sr., who scored 20 or more points in each of the last four games and leads the team at an average of 19.3 points.

ABOUT THE RAPTORS (12-4): Toronto held Philadelphia to 40.9 percent from the floor in a rematch of the Eastern Conference semifinals on Monday while Embiid went 0-of-11. "Just being physical with them, not giving them easy shots, obviously making it tough for Embiid to catch it, or anything like that, and they made a lot of threes, so we made sure we got out on shooters, make them bounce it, so I think that’s what we did at the end there to get the stops that we needed," Raptors forward Pascal Siakam told reporters. Siakam once again led the offense with 25 points and is averaging 25.7 points and 8.4 rebounds to help keep the team in the win column with All-Star point guard Kyle Lowry (thumb) out.

BUZZER BEATERS

1. Knicks rookie SF RJ Barrett (Illness) sat out Sunday and is day-to-day.

2. Raptors PF Serge Ibaka (ankle) is getting closer to a return and could dress on Wednesday.

3. Toronto took all four meetings last season by an average of 20.5 points.

PREDICTION: Raptors 121, Knicks 105