Newcastle remain confident they can still avoid a third consecutive NRL wooden spoon, despite being trampled 33-12 by the Wests Tigers on Sunday.

The loss dropped the Knights below the Tigers at the bottom of the ladder, and they now need at least two wins from their final seven games to avoid last place.

Billed by players as their grand final, the Knights turned in their worst performance of the season as they completed just 68 per cent of their sets and went to the break down 20-0, from which they never recovered.

The Knights were unlucky to be denied two tries either side of halftime - one from a questionable forward pass call - but they were still completely outplayed by the Tigers.

When asked on Sunday whether they could still avoid the spoon, forward Jamie Buhrer was forthright in his response.

"Of course," Buhrer said.

"There have been plenty of games we've played this year we feel we could have won."

"I'm certainly confident we can get some wins up over the back half of the year, but we've got to be a lot better than that."

The Knights have a winnable game next week against Canterbury, who will be without three State of Origin players as well as captain James Graham (neck) and lock Greg Eastwood (knee).

They also have the warriors in Newcastle, who have won just one game in Australia this year.

Meanwhile coach Nathan Brown refused to blame halfback Trent Hodkinson, who had an unhappy return to first grade after being dropped to NSW Cup for two months.

Nathan Ross was also disappointing in his second game at fullback, as Brown questioned whether the changes in the spine could have affected the team's attack.

"Our attack struggled," Brown said.

"There were some blokes in key positions whose performances really fluctuated a lot which probably didn't help.

"It was clearly our worst attacking performance for a long time. Why that was? You can't just blame that one player."

The loss could have come at a cost for the Knights, after winger Ken Sio injured his shoulder and did not return.