New Yorkers argue about everything: the best pizza, the best bagel, the best borough. Yankees fans won't sit next to Mets fans.
Giants and Jets fans share only a home state. But when the Knicks make a playoff run, the city becomes one big, loud family.
That is happening now.
The Knicks are in the NBA Finals for the first time since 1999, opening Game 1 on Wednesday, June 3 against the San Antonio Spurs after sweeping Cleveland and winning 11 straight playoff games.
The city hasn't had a moment like this in 27 years.
A City Transformed
Mike Greenberg, host of ESPN's Get Up and a lifelong Knicks fan from Greenwich Village, says the team changes the entire atmosphere of the streets.
“You always feel like you’re in the biggest city in the world, like you are in the center of the universe.
And the Knicks are the one team that makes New York feel like a small town, because everyone is wearing their Knicks shirts and everyone is yelling ‘Go Knicks’ in the street,” Greenberg told USA Today Sports.
Greenberg has spent decades thinking about this.
In 2014, when Super Bowl XLVII was in New York, he noticed the buzz was confined to Midtown.
“The moment I went down to the Village to visit my parents, you would not have been aware the Super Bowl was in New York,” he said.
But now, he says, you cannot walk a block in any borough without knowing what's going on.
“The Knicks being in the Finals is bigger in New York than the Super Bowl,” Greenberg said.
Why the Knicks Resonate
Suzyn Waldman, the voice of the Yankees who covered the Knicks for a decade, has a theory.
“Every other sport has more than one team,” she told USA Today Sports. “For a long time, it was just the Knicks.
It’s the city’s sport. All you need is a basketball court and a ball.”
She notes that generations of players, coaches, and scouts came from New York, creating deep connections with fans.
The Spurs roster itself includes Brooklyn native Julian Champagnie, who played at Bishop Loughlin and St. John's.
Harvey Araton, longtime New York Times columnist and author of When the Garden Was Eden, agrees.
He points out that the Knicks' arena sits in the heart of Manhattan, with Penn Station running underneath.
“The Yankees play in the South Bronx. The Mets are out in Flushing.
The Knicks play literally in the heart of New York. It connects everyone to this arena,” Araton told USA Today Sports.
After the Knicks swept the Cavaliers to clinch their Finals spot, fans flooded Seventh Avenue.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani is planning sanctioned watch parties around the city for every Finals game.
For fans like Greenberg, the stakes are personal.
He sat next to his father at hundreds of Knicks games growing up, and now he's taking his own children.
“I’ve waited essentially my entire life to see one of my teams win a title,” he said.
