Newcastle are in unfamiliar territory with Nathan Brown's boys to go into Sunday's NRL 'Spoon Bowl' against the Wests Tigers as favourites.
For the first time since their round 26, 2015 clash with Penrith, Newcastle will head into a game as the more fancied side with the bookies, according to the TAB.
In that match the Panthers ran out 30-12 winners, relegating the Knights to their first of back-to-back wooden spoons.
Ahead of their clash with the last-placed Wests Tigers, the Knights are $1.80 with Ivan Cleary's side $2.00 outsiders.
The match could decide who finishes the year on the bottom of the ladder with the Tigers equal on eight points with the Knights (15th).
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The Knights have held the wood over the joint venture in the recent past having won five of their last seven encounters.
The Knights are showing signs of improvements having pushed finals contenders Manly and St George Illawarra to within four points over the last fortnight.
"They're a pretty dangerous team," fullback Nathan Ross said of the Tigers.
"If you want to go out there and play touch football with them, they've added (Tui) Lolohea to their team, they've got Luke Brooks who's shown he's a quality player, Aaron Woods is a State of Origin player, James Tedesco, Dave Nofoaluma is probably one of the best play one, play two ball runners in the game.
"So they've got all the strike power there. It's also the strong team they've fielded in the last month."
The Knights are set to receive a boost with Jamie Buhrer to return from a long-term foot injury while premiership-winner and ex-NSW halfback Trent Hodkinson is rumoured to be on the cusp of returning to first grade after spending the last seven matches in NSW Cup.
They lacked cooler heads as the Dragons overturned a 28-10 halftime deficit to beat them 32-28 on Sunday and Buhrer will add some much-needed experience.
"We need to hold onto possession and slow the ruck down to speed we want to play at," Ross said.
"When we hold the ball we've shown we can be dangerous."
