It’s hard to imagine anyone had this game circled on their calendars when the schedule came out before the season. It’s a random game late in January where the Knicks are playing a non-rival team, and a very bad one at that, on the road. Yet, for more reasons than one, there’s likely going to be a good amount of people tuning in.
First of all, this will be New York’s first game without Julius Randle this season, meaning fans and analysts around the league are likely going to be curious about how Tom Thibodeau and the Knicks operate both schematically and rotation-wise to combat the loss of their star forward.