Can Knicks survive with a mishmash of six players getting bulk of minutes?

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With three and a half minutes remaining in the third quarter, Jalen Brunson exited a tight game against the Toronto Raptors. Julius Randle stayed on the floor. To begin the fourth, Randle headed to the bench. Brunson re-entered.

This appears to be the new trend.

New York Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau has shaken up his rotation once again. On Monday, either Randle or Brunson stayed in the game for every second of the last two quarters and into overtime. Such has been the goal ever since RJ Barrett returned from a finger injury four games ago.

Thibodeau is staggering his two top players in second halves, though he’s doing it in different ways. Brunson played well into the fourth quarters of Friday’s and Sunday’s matches before subbing out. Randle sat for the beginnings of the fourths in those.

The reasoning is clear: If the Knicks want to score, they need one of their potential All-Stars to make it happen.

Knicks games had a predictable cadence over the past two seasons. The starters dug a hole; the reserves scrambled to refill it until the starters returned with a bigger shovel. But especially during this recent hot stretch, which began with Thibodeau shrinking the rotation to nine players, the style has flipped. The first unit now eviscerates. The reserves fight on defense but struggle to score.

The Knicks bench has averaged only 21 points per game since Thibodeau shrunk the rotation to nine on Dec. 4, the lowest figure in the league. Beyond Immanuel Quickley, who has contributed more than a third of those points, nets go untouched.

Thibodeau has routinely played Miles McBride, Quickley, Obi Toppin (who just returned from injury) and Isaiah Hartenstein together. He includes Barrett with them. But lately, he’s used McBride as only a first-half player.

As the season goes on, the onus is shifting more and more onto only six guys: the five usual starters, plus Quickley. And thus, after a first half against the Raptors when the second unit once again didn’t score much, Thibodeau had to stagger once again.

Randle played with the bench to close the third; Brunson ran with it at the beginning of the fourth.

“I think the thing right now is getting the second group into rhythm again,” Thibodeau said. “So, the big thing was RJ’s a big part of that. He was out for an extended period, as was Obi, so now they’re coming back and now we gotta get the rhythm of that group going again. And I thought they gave us some good minutes. And Deuce is a big part of that, as well.”

The Knicks had no choice but to get creative. They score only 102.9 points per 100 possessions when both Randle and Brunson are off the floor this season, according to Cleaning the Glass. Camels could barely survive such droughts. If that figure belonged to a team, it’d be last in the league by far.

New York may have faltered in overtime Monday against Toronto, but at least those crucial moments came with the team’s top talent out there.

Thibodeau has been flowing in this direction. Since Dec. 21, Randle and Brunson are first and third in the NBA, respectively, in minutes per game. Meanwhile, the six guys in his circle of trust are absorbing more and more responsibilities, especially since Barrett returned last week.

A mishmash of the six makes up the closing lineups. Against the Raptors, Brunson, Quentin Grimes, Barrett, Randle, Mitchell Robinson and Quickley combined to play 88 percent of the Knicks’ available minutes. During the previous game, a win in Detroit, they played 89 percent of them. In the one before that, the win at Washington, they played 84 percent of them. In the one before that, the home victory over the Indiana Pacers, the six played 90 percent of available minutes.

You may have noticed: three of those four games were wins. The only one that wasn’t was a hard-fought overtime loss on the second day of a back-to-back. Part of the reason the Knicks have won 15 of 22 is that they play their best players more than most other teams do. Coincidentally, the Raptors, who have topped New York two of three times this season, take a similar approach.

But the benefits of minute distribution form a bell-shaped curve. Keep your top talent on the bench for too long, and you won’t be as good. Use them too much, and (even amidst winning) it can signal that cracks are forming.

Derrick Rose, Evan Fournier and Cam Reddish are in timeout. Hartenstein receives the backup center minutes and, save for Robinson foul trouble, no more. Jericho Sims is behind him, currently not playing. Toppin is still easing back from a leg fracture, but something has been off since even before the injury. He has failed to score in double-figures for 17 consecutive games. McBride is a defensive pest but has been one of the NBA’s least-efficient shooters. Of 332 qualifying players, he ranks 330th in true-shooting percentage.

So, here they are, with only a half-dozen players soaking up a disproportionate amount of minutes and the coach progressively placing an even greater burden on those six. The Knicks, 25-20 on the season, are contending to rise above the Play-In Tournament. Come the postseason, trust in only six is not enough.

So, what’s next?

The trade deadline is only three weeks away. And like when they brought in Rose a couple of seasons ago, the Knicks could use another source of offense.

Maybe they find someone to take McBride’s minutes — though front offices in contact with the Knicks say that New York has expressed it does not want to move the 22-year-old. The Knicks are high on his defensive ability, energy and work ethic. Those league sources also say the Knicks have become far more resistant to trading Quickley, who they were making calls about earlier in the season, before the team took off on this 15-7 run and before Quickley solidified himself as one of Thibodeau’s top six.

Maybe a guard currently on the trade market could provide New York’s offense with a jolt. Maybe they go after a wingy forward. Maybe it’s the Houston Rockets’ Eric Gordon, who has been on the trade block since Apollo 11. Word around the league is that the Rockets want a first-round pick for the former NBA Sixth Man of the Year. We’ll see if they get that.

Or maybe the target is Jae Crowder, whose trade-me saga with the Phoenix Suns has persisted for almost half a year. Maybe it’s not one of the conventional names that keep surfacing in the rumor mill. Maybe it’s a younger guy with multiple years remaining on his contract so the Knicks have someone to grow with the rest of the team’s youth, something like what they attempted with the Reddish trade (though they would hope this deal is more successful).

The Knicks would play a delicate game with any hypothetical trade, too. Yes, the reserves aren’t scoring, but someone like McBride has also been a key part of the rugged identity the group has assumed during its 22-game heater. New York could add a talented scorer, but if he doesn’t guard or doesn’t sprint through every game like it’s the last one he’ll ever play, then the offense he brings may not matter.

Maybe Toppin recovers the relentless energy that guided him through the past couple of seasons. He is, after all, returning from a fracture. Giving him time to regain his footing is only reasonable. But Thibodeau’s leash for him has always been short, even when Toppin is performing at his best. Maybe one of the outcasts, Fournier or Rose, climbs out of the doghouse before the deadline arrives.

But that date is only 23 days away, and the Knicks have decisions to make. This team is in the sweet spot of the unknown: above the Play-In Tournament, meaning it’s good enough to justify a short-term upgrade, but still only sixth in the Eastern Conference, not high enough to rationalize a move that compromises the future in any meaningful way.

But if they continue to function as they have lately, they need reinforcements. Trust in six is not enough.

(Photo of Julius Randle, Jalen Brunson and RJ Barrett: John Fisher / Getty Images)