There have been few recent nights like the one awaiting the Knicks Thursday night. There have been so few times across the past 20 years when the Knicks have only good things awaiting them on any night of the calendar, June or January or any night in between. Thursday is one of those nights.

Thursday, the Knicks will welcome a star to their midst.

And unless something goofy happens before them — if the Pelicans somehow forget how to pronounce “Zion Williamson” in the leadoff spot, if the Grizzlies somehow forget that on Wednesday they traded away franchise icon Mike Conley to pave the way for Ja Morant — that star will be RJ Barrett. It will be a good night for a change. It will be a positive step forward for a franchise that needs so many simply to regain its way.

All of that is the Knicks’ for the taking.

Assuming the men who run the Knicks don’t overthink this, of course.

And for a time, it looked like that might be exactly what Scott Perry and Steve Mills were doing, when they invested some time meeting with Vanderbilt’s Darius Garland on Wednesday. Garland, by all accounts, is a terrific player, though his freshman year with the Commodores was limited to five games thanks to a left knee injury. He is perhaps the most likely candidate to prove that the labeling of this as a three-man draft was both unfair and unwarranted.

We wish him well with that pursuit.

It doesn’t change what the Knicks have to do here. Williamson is the draft’s holy grail, and Knicks fans spent months dreaming about him donning a No. 1 Knicks jersey. But if you watched Zion intently last year during his only season at Duke, it was impossible not to notice Barrett, too: less flashy, less explosive, but every bit the dominant, dynamic player.

How much? Barrett is the first major-college player to average as many as 22 points, seven rebounds and four assists in 26 years, since Anfernee Hardaway did it for Memphis in 1993. If you’re going to look for a comp, the Young Penny isn’t a bad one at all. And Barrett did that playing most of his games against the ACC, which is as challenging a basketball finishing school as there is in the college game.

This time last year, Barrett was not just the presumptive No. 1 pick in this draft, but the consensus. The fact Williamson emerged as one of the most fascinating college players in years doesn’t obscure the fact Barrett was terrific in his own right — all of that at age 18.

He is exactly the building block the Knicks covet, as long as they don’t suffer from paralysis by analysis.

(And if they do? Knicks fans have turned a lot of cheeks for a lot of years. There have been any number of failed reboots, restarts, recalibrations. Part of the misery of 65 losses can be alleviated with the reality that it helped put them in position to do the right thing. Do the wrong thing here? Hell hath no fury like a Knicks fan pushed beyond their boiling point.)

“RJ will flourish here in New York,” Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said the other day. “He wants to be here. He is so mature. He just turned 19 [June 14], but he’s been a part of the Canadian basketball program since he was a little guy, always played up.”

The Knicks have been smart so far, holding to their plan. The Hawks tried to seduce them with two top-10 picks in exchange for No. 3; Mills and Perry said no, thanks. The Rockets reportedly tried to dangle Chris Paul and his bloated salary and fading game to the Knicks, and you would hope before they declined both men might have enjoyed a chuckle at the absurdity of such a move.

They have sold patience and promised restraint, the first of which was necessary for fans who sat through the 17-65 tire fire that was the 2018-19 season, the second of which is on them, sticking to their plans, favoring rational over rash. That will be tested in a few weeks when the Knicks have to ponder making a real run at Kevin Durant, knowing a quarter of their deal with him will have to go toward a virtual medical redshirt next year, but that’s a debate for the days leading up to June 30.

For now, for Thursday night, there is only one thing to focus on and it is all good, because RJ Barrett will be an All-Star in the NBA, and for many years, and he will get there as a Knick.

As long as they don’t get too cute, too fancy, too smart. The right player is going to be sitting there for them. Just take him, and move along.