Even for those outside of New York, these Knicks took us on a magical championship ride
Six blocks from New York’s Madison Square Garden, the driver finally surrendered to gridlock, opening the doors of his car so his passengers could join the throngs of people heading to Game 4 of the NBA Finals.
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Retired Villanova basketball coach Jay Wright and his wife, Patty, had no choice but to step straight into the madness, joining the jubilant sea of humanity that took over New York along this crazy Knicks championship ride.
This was Wright’s first time in attendance during the Knicks’ dominant playoff run, mindful as he was of being any sort of distraction to his three former players on New York’s roster. But when Knicks assistant coach Rick Brunson urged him to come, Wright acquiesced, heeding the will of the man who raised the heart and soul of those so-called ’Nova Knicks, his former star Jalen Brunson.
Like the rest of basketball nation, Wright couldn’t resist the pull of this most captivating team. Led by Brunson, alongside his former national title-winning college teammates Josh Hart and Mikal Bridges, together with fellow starters Karl Anthony Towns and OG Anunoby, these Knicks took us on a magical playoff ride.
“I think everyone bonding, coming together, having the mind-set of just believing in each other, never giving up, no matter what the situation was, made this all possible,” Brunson said in the aftermath of the team’s clinching game Saturday night in San Antonio, when yet another double-digit, fourth-quarter deficit was no match for a group determined to break a 53-year franchise title drought.
Even begrudging Bostonians have to acknowledge this was something special, knowing better than anyone what it’s like to be caught up in the thrill of an unexpected championship journey. Like the 2001 Patriots or 2004 Red Sox, the Knicks wrote a story unconstrained by home borders or provincial loyalty, resonating in a way that wasn’t just felt in New York (which Bostonians will also delight in pointing out hadn’t won an NFL/NHL/MLB/NBA title since the 2011 Giants) but throughout the entire NBA.
From a star-studded celebrity row that ran the gamut from longtime diehard Spike Lee to bandwagon-jumper Taylor Swift, from the polarizing drama of President Trump returning to his onetime home to attend Game 3, to the similarly divisive Knicks owner James Dolan who invited him, from the rise of a young, sports-loving (and Trump-opposing) city mayor Zohran Mamdani, to a pope named Leo whose own Villanova degree put him squarely on the Knicks’ side, these playoffs pushed the NBA’s profile to the stratosphere.
For a league once accused of rigging the 1984 draft lottery to send Patrick Ewing to Manhattan, it knows this is true: The NBA is better when the Knicks are good.
And it had taken a looooong time for the Knicks to be this good. Since 1973, when Walt “Clyde” Frazier, Dave DeBusschere, Earl Monroe, Willis Reed, and Bill Bradley last won, it’s been a litany of near-misses and full heartbreak, of misplayed Ewing finger rolls and misfired John Starks 3-pointers. Through Pat Riley’s slick suits and Jeff Van Gundy’s sideline scowls, through the desperate hiring of Phil Jackson and the surprising firing of Tom Thibodeau, the Knicks just couldn’t get over the hump.
Until they could.
Here they are, owners of, statistically, the most dominant playoff run of all time. The Knicks lost only three games across four playoff series, pulled off history’s greatest NBA playoff comeback in that unforgettable Game 4 win, and erased their fourth final frame major deficit of the Finals on the night they clinched. The run included a 13-game winning streak, saw them outscore opponents by an average 14.9 points a game (best in playoff history) and, as the NBA’s official website pointed out, revealed their clutch play as they outscored teams, 345-166, in the last six seconds of the shot clock.
“I was [coach] at Hofstra when Pat Riley was with the Knicks, and that was magical in itself, but this is a whole ’nother level,” Wright said. “I’m old enough to remember the magic of Bradley, DeBusschere, Willis Reed, Walt Frazier. I remember that and I really think these players are beloved like that group. That group was the same way. Not superstars, humble, great teamwork, intelligent.
“To hear Walt Frazier compare them to his teams meant the world to me. Coming from him, he’s an iconic figure to me, and for him to say that really epitomized how New Yorkers feel about this team.”
On Thursday, the team will be feted with a parade along New York’s Canyon of Heroes, riding floats through Wall Street’s financial district (where the name “ticker-tape parade” was coined thanks to the torn-up pieces of 1-inch stockbroker ribbon raining down from corporate office windows above) and up to City Hall, filling the hearts of local fans priced out of making it inside the walls of the world’s most famous arena but getting to be part of the story now. A story that will live forever in Anunoby’s unbelievable putback to win Game 4; Brunson’s 45-point masterpiece in Game 5.
“We actually thought about leaving after the third quarter Wednesday, thinking it’s just not their night, but we were like, ‘No, we just gotta hang in there,’ and thank God we did,” said Wright, who had Brunson, Hart, Bridges (as well as former Knick Donte DiVincenzo) on his 2015-16 NCAA champions, and Brunson, Hart, and DiVincenzo on his 2017-18 title team.
“That was one of the most amazing comebacks I’ve ever seen in my life. Being in the Garden, the crowd just stayed with that team. It was like everyone believed it was going to happen. There were 18,500 there and everyone stayed, everyone sang Frank Sinatra’s ‘New York, New York,’ and Jay-Z’s ‘Empire State of Mind,’ you’re out on the court with everyone, sharing hugs.
“It was one of my favorite sporting moments of all-time.”
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