Originally Posted by jacobsdad

bismillah,
I'm a rehab professional and totally agree with Lykolate, but you also may need to check your position in the saddle.
Make sure that your knee is slightly behind your toes when the crank is horizontal. If your knee is too far forward, you'll be putting a
tremendous amount of stress over the patellar ligament. The same irritation can be felt if you do squats wrong- knee should be behind toes there too.
Let me also ask you this: does it hurt just slightly below your knee cap? I'm guessing yes.