WHAT IS THE POINT?

Knicks insist on finding out if Mudiay is really this awful

MIAMI — The Knicks keep inserting Emmanuel Mudiay in the starting lineup, and the results remain as unimpressive as Papa John’s pizza.

But Jeff Hornacek isn’t keen on suggestions that he should alter his point-guard rotation.

“There you go with, ‘Let’s change the starting lineups,’ and ‘Let’s do whatever,’” the coach said after the Knicks were blasted by Miami on Wednesday, 119-98. “We may do that going forward, I don’t know. A game like this isn’t on Emmanuel.”

Hornacek was understandably annoyed about being peppered with questions about Mudiay under the circumstances Wednesday, when it was the bench that produced the biggest clunker. But this was more about the body of work for Mudiay — a 16-game trial with the Knicks that includes a field-goal percentage of 36 and averages of 9.7 points and 4.4 assists over 25 minutes per. The 22-year-old is a model of inefficiency, shooting just 18 percent from beyond the arc and 65 percent from the foul line.

Asked what he’d like to do better, Mudiay — who is wrapping up his third NBA season — replied, “Everything really, to be honest with you.”

Mudiay has been outplayed consistently by his counterpart coming off the bench, Trey Burke, but the Knicks are committed to seeing if there’s something worth salvaging from a career gone sideways.

After being benched in Denver, Mudiay was traded to the Knicks for Doug McDermott and a second-round pick. New York is 3-13 since that deal. “We’re not just going to have (13 games with Mudiay starting) and make a judgment call on a guy,” Hornacek said. “We’ve seen the other guys. The other guys are coming off the bench. Trey continues to prove that he’s a guy that can really give us something. We’re trying to see and see if he can get used to our guys and we just go that way.”

It’s true the Knicks have had a longer look at Burke and Frank Ntilikina, but not in the lineup.

Both of them have zero starts at point guard, while Mudiay continues to rack up the bulk of the minutes at that position. He’s under contract through next season and represents the biggest acquisition for GM Scott Perry following the Carmelo Anthony deal.

Maybe that’s why he has such a long leash and preaching patience.

“It’s just going to come with time,” Mudiay said. “I just got to keep learning the system, learning all that. We just got to get better as a team. I think we get too stagnant. When we get too stagnant we make ourselves take tough shots. That’s on me and that’s on everybody. You saw how Miami was playing, the ball was moving, whoever was open take the open shot. We got to do more of that. If we do more of that it’s not going to be just me with a breakout game. It’s going to be a bunch of us with a breakout game. If we play the right way, we’ll get a lot more points. We got too much talent to be scoring 98 points.”

Mudiay has one year remaining on his contract, but the evidence suggests the Knicks will be in the market for a starting point guard over the summer.

KNICKS vs. T’WOLVES 7:30 on MSG