Posted by Sabrina B. @gametimegirl

Carmelo Anthony simply shrugged his shoulders after one 3-pointer fell, surprised at how easy things came against the Toronto Raptors.

A battle for playoff positioning on Wednesday figures to be much tougher.

Toney Douglas scored 28 points, Anthony and Amare Stoudemire each added 23, and the New York Knicks closed within a half-game of sixth place in the Eastern Conference with a 131-118 rout on Tuesday night for their fourth straight victory.

Chauncey Billups had 13 points and nine assists for the Knicks, who can move ahead of the 76ers for the No. 6 seed when they travel to Philadelphia on Wednesday. It’s a rare key game in the springtime for the Knicks, usually long out of contention by now but headed back to the postseason for the first time since 2004.

“It’s going to be a big game tomorrow night, a very important game for us,” Stoudemire said. “We’re really trying to make a push to move up the standings. And so Philly’s playing well, and we owe them boys.”

The Knicks rang up 78 points in their highest-scoring first half of the season, shot 58 percent overall and coasted to their fourth victory over Toronto this season, sweeping the season series for the first time since 2001-02.

“I thought we did a great job of getting the ball out fast, getting stops first and foremost, getting the ball out and running,” Billups said. “Melo got hot obviously in that first half and he was rolling and we just kind of fed off his energy and his shots.”

Anthony, Billups and Anthony hit consecutive 3-pointers for the Knicks late in the half, with Anthony shrugging his shoulders similar to Michael Jordan against Portland in the 1992 NBA finals after improving to 5 for 5 from beyond the arc before missing his next one.

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