The Knicks could be shorthanded again when they host the Suns on Friday night.
Mitchell Robinson (concussion protocol), Derrick Rose (sprained ankle) and Taj Gibson (sore groin) have been listed as questionable to face Phoenix. All three sat out the home victory over the Lakers on Tuesday.
The visit by red-hot Phoenix, which has a 14-game winning streak, is the front end of back-to-back games for the Knicks. The second game will be their first trip to Atlanta since Trae Young and the Hawks knocked them out of the playoffs in June.
The Knicks didn’t hold media availability on Thanksgiving, but coach Tim Thibodeau said on Wednesday that Robinson was “making progress” and going through “all the protocols” since he was elbowed in the nose by Houston’s Jae’Sean Tate on Saturday night in a home win over the Rockets.
“If he gets cleared, he’ll be a go,” Thibodeau said Wednesday when asked about Robinson, who has appeared in 15 of the Knicks’ 18 games after undergoing season-ending foot surgery in March. “There’s a progression to it, so he’s going through each phase, and there’s still more for him to go through before he’s cleared.”
Thibodeau added Wednesday that Rose and Gibson “did a little bit” in practice, but they still were considered day-to-day. The game Tuesday against the Lakers was the first that the 33-year-old Rose has sat out this season. The 36-year-old Gibson has missed each of the Knicks’ past three contests.
Despite the recent absences, former lottery pick Kevin Knox hasn’t gotten off the bench in any of the past eight games, since a one-minute stint on Nov. 7 against the Cavaliers. The ninth-overall pick in 2018 out of Kentucky, Knox has logged just seven minutes over three appearances this season, scoring just one point.
With Rose sidelined, Thibodeau used rookie Quentin Grimes for five scoreless minutes off the bench in the victory Tuesday over the Lakers.