The dreaded Western Conference road trip is almost at an end. Can the Knicks emerge from Los Angeles with a winning record during this trip?

The Knicks have already secured at least a .500 record for this daunting Western Conference road trip. That was by and large a mark most people would’ve felt good about before the trip started.

Now, against a LeBron-less Lakers, they have a chance to come back to the Atlantic side of things with a 4-2 road swing record, with three winnable (if not total gimme) games to close the season at Madison Square Garden.

The Lakers aren’t in great shape right now. They’ve lost eight of their last 11 games, including five of their last seven. In sort of a weird inverse from the Knicks of late, they beat Phoenix in their last game, but lost to the Clippers three games ago. And they beat the Nuggets. So it’s kinda a giant circle trying to play the “transitive property” game with this one.

Ultimately, I think the swing factor here is going to come down to how the players other than the stars perform. Julius Randle and Anthony Davis are going to ball their asses off, as usual. Who can step up on either team outside of those two?

Without Dennis Schroder, I think it’s pretty likely that Derrick Rose can cook the point guard matchup, as he has been lately. RJ Barrett should also be able to feast on either Kentavious Caldwell-Pope or Kyle Kuzma, for different reasons. And I’m not too worried about Andre Drummond, considering the Knicks pretty easily handled him the last time around.

It probably wouldn’t be wise to underestimate the Lakers, though. The defending champs are a pack of wounded animals with their backs up against the play-in wall. It’s not out of the question that the Warriors could jump them for the No. 7 seed, forcing the Lakers to hit the road to face the Warriors in the first play-in game (and increasing the chances they might lose and have to play in the 8-seed game).

The game is tonight at 10 on TNT. Come hang with us on Twitter!