Allan Houston had his best game of the season with 25 points on 8-for-12 shooting, and Jerome Williams played 44 minutes in his first start for the Knicks to lead New York past the Portland Trail Blazers 113-105 last night.

Williams had 15 points, six rebounds, and four assists, setting a positive tone early in the first quarter by knocking a ball loose from Ruben Patterson and diving over the baseline to save it.

Williams also had two fast-break baskets in the fourth quarter that helped the Knicks end a season-high four-game losing streak and get back to .500 (17-17).

The victory should provide some job security for Knicks coach Lenny Wilkens, who acknowledged before the game that his slumping team has chemistry problems to go along with its assortment of injuries.

Williams started in place of Tim Thomas, who sat out due to knee and calf injuries, and Houston made his eighth consecutive start in place of Jamal Crawford (toe injury).

Houston made four 3-pointers while surpassing his previous season-high of 21, and Stephon Marbury had 20 points and 12 assists while outplaying his cousin, Portland rookie Sebastian Telfair.

Zach Randolph scored 27 and Patterson added 20 for the Trail Blazers, whose losing streak increased to three games as they dropped a season-low four games under .500 (14-18) while starting a six-game, nine-day road trip.

The Trail Blazers, losers of six of their last seven games, fell behind by double digits in the first quarter and never got closer than six points in the fourth quarter while exerting little effort defensively and showing only brief flashes of cohesion offensively.

Portland allowed the Knicks to shoot a season-high 59%, with New York scoring 26 points on the fast break. One of the Knicks’ nicest looking fast-break buckets gave Marbury his 12th and final assist when he fed Trevor Ariza for an alley-oop dunk off a 3-on-1 break for a 107-92 lead with 2:53 remaining.

The Blazers had pulled within seven points on Damon Stoudamire’s 3-pointer that made it 84-77 just seconds into the fourth quarter, but the Knicks responded with a 7-0 run ending in a three-point play by Williams off another 3-on-1 break.

The victory was the 1,332nd of Lwnny Wilkens’s coaching career and his 40th in 76 games with New York since taking over from Don Chaney nearly a year ago. The Knicks’ recent slide had rekindled talk about Wilkens’s job security – chatter that’ll likely continue absent a vote of confidence or some other display of support from team president Isiah Thomas.

Thomas, who had a lengthy talk with team owner James Dolan under the stands in the minutes before the opening tip, would not answer directly when asked about Wilkens’s job security, saying he was mostly satisfied with the Knicks’ current standing.