NBA

Time for Knicks coach to point to Douglas

Look, I’m not going to lie to you: The Knicks would seem to have three options at point guard heading into Elimination Game No. 2 tomorrow night in Miami, and each seems more ridiculous than the others when you list them in descending order of preposterousness:

1. Baron Davis could awaken this morning the same way Bobby Ewing woke up back in the day, and the awful reality of his shredded, ruined knee will all have been a dream.

2. Jeremy Lin could show up for work this morning, declare himself ready to play, and the rest of the world can channel Bobby Ewing and pretend that the fact he looked like a CYO point guard the last time he played the Heat just before the All-Star break — with two healthy knees that time — never happened. And, by the way, also hope that rushing back doesn’t promote his busted-up knee injury from minor to major.

3. Mike Bibby can summon his 2002 self the way he did for a few stolen moments in Sunday’s Game 4, make the wide-open 3s the Heat are begging him to take (since they saw him miss so many last year, when he was on their side), run the Knicks offense for 40 minutes or so, lose the gimp and the limp that partnered on him Sunday.

But what if I told you that there was someone on the Knicks’ roster who once averaged 10.6 points and 3.0 assists across a full 82-game NBA schedule? What if I told you that guy was 26 years old, healthy, and undoubtedly fresh since he hasn’t exactly had to deal with much recent wear and tear? Or that as recently as last year he had scoring outbursts of 30, 29 and 28, had a couple of double-doubles, knocked down nine 3-pointers in a game?

Where have you gone, Toney Douglas? The Knicks may have to cast a lonely eye to you, and soon. Woo, woo, woo.

“I haven’t buried Toney,” Knicks coach Mike Woodson said yesterday. “But I can’t play everybody.”

Woodson wasn’t around last year when Douglas showed hints, lots of them, of a true breakthrough. Mostly he blossomed as a combo guard, taking to Mike D’Antoni’s pinball offense, but when Chauncey Billups missed substantial time in March and April, Douglas served as a better-than-capable fill-in at the point. And that might have been his downfall.

Because after Billups was amnestied, before Linsanity, while Davis was healing his bad back, while Bibby seemed to calcify nightly early in the season, D’Antoni anointed Douglas his starting point guard, handed him the keys to the offense, the team, and the three superstars.

And he was dreadful.

He was tentative. He was confused. He didn’t commit a lot of turnovers, but the ones he made always seemed soul-crushing and sloppy. Worse, he could never get his shot going. He was 33 percent from the floor in December, 31 percent in January, then Lin replaced him and it was as if Douglas immediately entered witness protection.

And with the notable exception of an April 5 win at Orlando — 25 minutes, 15 points, six assists — he’s been invisible. From Feb. 6 through March 30, he played a total of 22 minutes. Several times, Woodson has threatened with the idea of playing him, and each time it went the way he said it went Sunday when he pondered it: “I was contemplating starting Toney,” Woodson said. “But I changed my mind.”

Even now, there is no guarantee. If Lin doesn’t go — and he shouldn’t — then Bibby surely will start. But he can’t play 48. It is doubtful he can go 28. Woodson talked about going with a big lineup that would, essentially, make J.R. Smith and Carmelo Anthony de facto point guards. Toney?

“If they put [Norris] Cole, Toney could be in there,” Woodson said; Cole has played 19 minutes, total, in the series.

Which is 19 more minutes than Toney Douglas has gotten. Maybe he’s too far gone. Maybe his confidence is irretrievable. But if you’re Mike Woodson, if you’re the Knicks, where your point guards require gurneys more than Nikes, do you really want the season to expire without finding out for sure?

michael.vaccaro@nypost.com