The old standby is: It doesn’t matter who starts but who finishes.

Well, Arron Afflalo did his very best to present a diplomatically correct acceptance of that adage after recently going from starter to sixth man for the Knicks.

“I guess it’s just my job to be professional and give the team whatever they feel is necessary,” said Afflalo, who came off the bench Thursday for the fifth time in six games after starting his first 56 games. He scored 11 points in 29 minutes.

“Obviously, I’m still playing large minutes,” Afflalo said. “Finishing the game is always a priority. It’s obviously a different rhythm because you don’t get to come off of warm-ups and come into the game. You kind of just get thrust in there.”

Interim coach Kurt Rambis gave assorted reasons for the move that has Sasha Vujacic starting over Afflalo. Basically, Rambis wants more bench production.

“We’ve also stressed to them, all of them, that players are more valuable in a sense if they can come off the bench and be productive because it’s harder to do if you can find guys that accept that role,” Rambis said.

Afflalo averaged 13.9 points starting through 56 games in his first season for the Knicks after signing a two-year, $16 million free-agent deal — he can opt out this summer. As a bench player, Afflalo is averaging 11.5 points.

So could this new role affect his future in New York, with that opt-out clause?

“It’s one of those things I’ll have to weigh in June. But hopefully an entire body of work is looked at on both ends,” said Afflalo, who could head into the richest free-agency pool in history if he chooses, though he noted he was happy to reunite with Carmelo Anthony, his former Nuggets teammate. “There’s always great opportunities … and this is still one. Playing with Melo and helping this franchise progress, obviously it wasn’t the ideal season we were looking for.”

The Knicks whipped the Bulls off the glass, 45-34. Four of five starters — Kristaps Porzingis (10), Carmelo Anthony (7), Robin Lopez (7) and Jose Calderon (7) — had at least — right — seven.

The Knicks refused to play the “what might have been” card. After all, they did beat a contender twice in 48 hours.

“It shows us that we were capable of doing that,” Porzingis said. “We slipped a little bit during the season and weren’t playing well, but it shows we had enough talent — we have enough — to be there.”

The Bulls, who lost Joakim Noah to January shoulder surgery, were without Pau Gasol, who rested with swelling in his right knee.

“We knew going into the back-to-back that this was likely a possibility that he would miss one of the games. He’s got a little bit of swelling in that knee. We just don’t want to make it something where it would blow up and he’d miss a significant portion of the rest of the season,” Bulls coach Fred Hoiberg said.