American singer and now New Yorker Maggie Rogers has a song called ‘So Sick Of Dreaming’ about being stood up by a guy for a Knicks game. It kind of sounds like die-hard fan Timothée Chalamet not showing up for the Met Gala with Kylie Jenner. Good fan. Bad boyfriend.
Here’s the lyric…
“So, he calls me up 15 minutes before the reservation. I mean, I was AT THE RESTAURANT. So, I had two martinis at the bar, took the steaks to go, and went to meet my friends down the street. And by the way…the Knicks lost.”
Last season, in good humour on both sides, the New York Knicks even played this song soundbite when they introduced Rogers on the Madison Square Garden jumbotron.
But there’s a problem.
Penned in Maggie’s last newsletter to her fans she tells us that “after the song, the Knicks lost every single game (she) attended or watched.”
Was she at MSG for Game 3 after the Knicks 13-game winning streak was snapped?
They’ve still won nine straight on the road, a playoff record, though.
Like socks or practice short superstitions, Maggie Rogers met with Knicks ticketing at the next game she attended to try and reverse the curse. Ordering martinis and steaks before every game like only those who sit courtside can.
She needn’t worry now.
Especially with the hand of OG and the basketball Gods on all those who bleed orange instead of red’s side.
The rising star also said it best when she said “Game 5 has New York feeling like Obama was newly elected.”
The moment these finals were won.
Now after Game 6 in San Antonio, Texas, the New York Knicks are your NBA champions following a 94-90 win against the Spurs. Taking the series four games to one. Although competitively it reads a lot different than that.
It will still be 22-year-old Victor Wembanyama’s league soon like Tim Duncan talking to LeBron James when the King was just an early twenties’ prince.
You just have to give it to the Knicks this year.
This is the team’s third title and the first since 1973. Following the New York Liberty’s win in the W a few years back, this Knickerbocker championship glory comes with a little something special.
They have become the first franchise in NBA history to win the double, following their NBA Cup victory last fall. Although the other two cup winners, Milwaukee and LA, have both also won championships since 2020. Put some respect on their name and that other trophy.
The city court W sisterhood of the New York Liberty also won the WNBA’s Commissioner’s Cup (maybe it’s time to rename it the WNBA Cup) and a championship consecutively in 2023 and 2024.
But no one has done it like this…until now.
New York, New York. So good you have to crown them twice.
Finals MVP, and the point of all the great guards in the association, Jalen Brunson led the way with a huge 45 points (only Mike has scored as much in the Finals). Capped off by 13 straight in a Wimbledon like rally to close the fourth and the finals themselves.
Too small, hey?
The King of New York embracing his father, former Knick and assistant coach Rick Brunson for a beautiful father and son moment bonded in basketball.
Brunson and his bold, brutal and beautiful Knicks have come back from double-digit deficits in all four games that finally have them talking about Larry O’Brien.
For all the celebrity sightings (Prince Harry?!) in this champagne campaign (how about that ‘Do The Right Thing’ reunion?), there has been no bigger star in the sky than the man who covers half his face in celebration. Surpassing the great Willis Reed’s finals record 38 points against the Los Angeles Lakers in 1970.
Patrick Ewing, going against David Robinson here like the 1999 Finals, and all the Allan Houston like legends from that era that this New York team reminds you of. The young legacy Knicks have just eclipsed them all.
That legendary time in ’99. When the New York Knicks became the first eighth seed in NBA history to make the finals. Led by a cropped Houston, with his jersey that seemed two sizes too big for him, Latrell Sprewell, Charlie Ward, ’The Camby Man’ Marcus Camby and the big-game heroics of Larry Johnson throwing the L’s up like Cool J.
In these finals, former Brooklyn star Mikal Bridges had 14 points and x-actor Josh Hart added 13 as the ‘Nova Knicks’ went supernova.
On the valiant Spurs side, so close to not losing this game and series on their home floor, Wemby had 19 points, 14 rebounds and five blocks (three coming very early). But he was hearing it from former teammate Jeremy Sochan, as the game was getting away from San Antonio.
With Wembanyama and Stephon Castle, the Spurs had the last two rookies of the year, before Dallas Maverick Cooper Flagg took it across state this season. Look out for Dylan Harper to be an even bigger star than his dad, mind you. The rook had 25 points and has the future in his hands.
A spurred on Texan team will be titans again.
Yet, it’s all about the first Knicks’ title since 1973.
Legacy passed like the Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier to Brunson billboards across the street of New York.
That childish ‘Carmen’ music by Georges Bizet, that the Spurs played during Knick player introductions, seemed awfully quiet tonight.
The pandemonium on the podium was palpable. Coach Mike Brown leading the Knicks with a “who let the dogs out (who, who)” chant, after the team kept saying his name like the “mine, mine, mine” seagulls from Pixar’s ‘Finding Nemo’.
Who let the underdogs out?
Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike!
Finding jubilation in the victory, Josh Hart told an incredible Karl-Anthony Towns, “this is what movies are made of.”
KAT just had to give it up for his dear mama.
It’s too early to call it a dynasty. Since 2020, the NBA crown jewel has been changing more hands than pawnshops.
One thing is for certain though, it’s New York forever. Always Knicks.
Knicks in five. Knicks incredible.
