Knicks Must Experiment With This Lineup Change

The New York Knicks' center situation has kept this team in a chokehold all season long.

After being unable to replace Isaiah Hartenstein in free agency, the Knicks traded for Karl-Anthony Towns just before the start of the season to fill the void. However, Mitchell Robinson has been waiting in the wings, recovering from his ankle injury, in hopes of joining Towns in the frontcourt.

The two have yet to play together this season as Robinson hasn't made his debut, prompting Bleacher Report writer Grant Hughes to question the legitimacy of the effectiveness of a potential frontcourt with Towns and Robinson on the floor together.

"We’ve been saying it all year because it’s true: Mitchell Robinson and Karl-Anthony Towns need to share the floor together for an extended stretch so the New York Knicks can gauge their viability as a postseason tandem," Hughes writes.

"Robinson will help the Knicks no matter what. They need another big body to man the paint, control the glass and help them get back to generating great second-chance opportunities via offensive boards. But his fit next to Towns in double-big looks matters more to New York’s postseason ceiling than anything else," he continued.

"That doesn’t mean the Knicks will immediately bench Josh Hart and start Robinson if early results are promising. The team’s preferred starting lineup — with Hart next to Jalen Brunson, Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby and KAT — has a plus-5.9 net rating over a huge sample of minutes. That’s too good to mess with. But New York should absolutely tinker with configurations that add size, rim-protection and rebounding to its profile," Hughes wrote.

The smaller sample size the Knicks get with the pair of them, the less prepared they will be for the playoffs. In fact, it's hard to see Tom Thibodeau rock with a playoff rotation that he hasn't seen before in the regular season, so Robinson needs to get back on the court soon so he can build on-court chemistry with Towns and give the Knicks another look before the real games begin.

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