Knicks’ bid for No. 2 seed is on the line as schedule will finally get tougher

Next comes the harder part. Mostly because it can’t get any easier.

The Knicks spoke respectfully of their last six opponents and that’s fine/expected — they were facing NBA players, all of them, and when you watch the NCAA tournament remember that the Washington Wizards would obliterate St. John’s or Duke or whoever else you picked for the Final Four.

But the last six Knicks opponents, by NBA standards, stink. They’re either tanking all the time or tanking sometimes.

So the Knicks went 6-0 through their easiest part of the schedule and capped it Sunday with a 145-113 breeze over the Wizards, who’ve lost 16 in a row and probably feel good about it in the front office. The Wizards (16-55) are so bad they let Tyler Kolek go off for 11 points in the final five minutes — on the same day Kolek dropped 42 points in a G League game for the Westchester Knicks. And unlike some of the previous nail-biters during their winning streak — ahem, at Brooklyn on Friday — the Knicks looked dominant against an overmatched opponent.