This Is What We Waited For.

The Knicks did it. That was unbelievable. Something I didn't fully grasp last night, and I'm not sure I still do this morning. But I'm elated. I'm so happy.

When it got to the point where it was just free throws, that's when you kind of knew things were happening. The emotions started to swell. And then it happened. My first reaction wasn't to jump and scream. My first reaction was to turn around, curl into a ball, and just take it in. It was different.

This is not my first championship. I was a kid of the nineties. I grew up with the Yankees winning everything, and it became routine. I got used to it. And then nothing. The Knicks never won anything while I've been cognizant. I knew about the championships in the seventies. I grew up with the nineties teams, Patrick Ewing. All the closeness of that era, the underdog story of my Houston-Sprewell Knicks. And then nothing.

We got a ray of light when Amar'e Stoudemire came over, but his knees blew out. We got Carmelo Anthony thinking he was gonna be the savior. Never quite worked. Little spurts of energy here and there, culminating with Linsanity in 2012, but ultimately that was nothing. And then despair. Even the most diehard Knicks fans couldn't tell you some of these lineups. But it was worth it. I'm glad I got to see it.

The 2026 New York Knickerbockers are the NBA Champions.

Led by Jalen Brunson. He had his teammates with him. They brought over Josh Hart. Traded for OG Anunoby, Karl-Anthony Towns, Mikal Bridges. Kept Mitchell Robinson around as the defensive anchor. The role guys knew what they had to do. Jose Alvarado, big trade during the middle of the year. Landry Shamet stuck around after Malcolm Brogdon randomly retired. Jordan Clarkson out there doing his thing. Duce McBride. Ariel Hukporti. Mohamed Diawara. Tyler Kolek. Pacome Dadiet. Jeremy Sochan. That's your New York Knicks.

Jalen Brunson is the reason any of this happened. You already know what he is at this point. The captain. The closer. The guy who gets ground down over a seven-game series and still finds another gear when it matters most. His father Rick Brunson played in the NBA. Jalen grew up in gyms, around the game, with a father who knew exactly what it took to survive at this level. There is a reason he is never rattled. There is a reason no moment ever looks too big. He was raised for this. And the fact that he got to win a championship with his dad watching, knowing everything Rick put into him, is one of the most full-circle stories this city has seen in a long time.

But here is the part of the Brunson story that does not get enough credit. When he signed his extension, he took less money than he could have gotten on the open market. He left real money on the table, intentionally, so the Knicks could have the cap flexibility to build around him. Without that pay cut, there is no Karl-Anthony Towns. There is no Jose Alvarado. They could not have extended OG Anunoby. The whole roster construction that won this championship flows directly from the decision Jalen Brunson made to prioritize winning over his own bank account. That is not a small thing. That is everything. He did not need the money. He needed the ring. And he built the team that got him there.

He is not flashy. He does not need you to know how good he is. He just goes to work. That is the most New York thing about him.

OG Anunoby might have been the most important player in this entire run outside of Jalen Brunson. And the backstory here hits hard. OG was with Toronto when they won the championship in 2019. He was on the roster. He had the ring. But he was not an active part of that run due to injury — he never got to feel what it was like to truly be in the middle of it. He came to New York with something to prove and unfinished business to settle. When you talk about two-way players, you are talking about OG. He guarded the other team's best player every single night without complaint, and then on the other end he was capable of dropping thirty on you if you forgot about him for thirty seconds. His shooting in the Finals was absurd. Seven for nine from three in game four alone. The tip-in will live forever. The block before the tip-in might be even more important and does not get talked about enough. He is the guy who had a ring but never truly felt like he won one. This time he felt every bit of it. When the moment got its biggest, he was the one who reached up and ended it. Now he has one he can truly call his own.

Karl-Anthony Towns was the wild card that became the chess piece. And I don't think you can talk about KAT without talking about his mother, Jacqueline Cruz-Towns, who passed away from COVID-19 in 2020. That loss changed him. You could see it in the years after, the way he carried something heavier, the way he played with a different kind of urgency. Coming to New York was supposed to be his chance to finally win. People were not sure how he fit. Could he defend? Was he tough enough for a playoff run? He answered every single question. The way Mike Brown deployed him, using him as a facilitator, a screener, a finisher, someone who could draw Wembanyama away from the paint and make him guard in space, was a masterclass. And when he needed to score, he scored. This one was for her too.

Mikal Bridges was the glue. And let's not forget what it cost to get him. The Knicks gave up a mountain of picks to Brooklyn for this man, and the fanbase was split on whether it was worth it. Every time things went sideways during the season, someone brought up the picks. He heard all of it. He never said a word about it. He just showed up, played his game, hit his shots, guarded his man, and let his basketball do the talking. Quiet, consistent, always in the right spot. There were stretches in this postseason where he was simply not missing. The guy that cost all those picks turned out to be exactly what this team needed. Worth every single one of them.

Fuck them picks.

Josh Hart is the heartbeat of this team. All pun intended. Before New York, Josh Hart was a journeyman. He bounced around the league. He was a solid player, a good role guy, but nobody was building around him. And then he came to the Knicks and something clicked. He found his home. He found a fanbase that matched his energy completely, a crowd that appreciated every dive on the floor, every offensive rebound, every charge taken. The Garden loved him back as hard as he loved them. He had a rough game one of the Finals and then came back in game two with a monster line. That is who he is. He does not dwell. He does not pout. He shows up the next game and does the work. This team does not win a championship without Josh Hart.

Mitchell Robinson played through a broken hand. Broke it before the series even started, probably did it to himself knowing him, and still suited up. Let that sit for a second. He was not going to sit out the NBA Finals. He taped it up and got on the floor. And he was not scared of Wembanyama. Not for one second. His defensive presence, his lob threat, his ability to protect the rim, changed the series in ways the box score cannot fully capture. He did not have to score twenty points to matter. He just had to be Mitchell Robinson, impossible to move out of the paint, fearless, relentless. And he was, every single night, broken hand and all.

Jose Alvarado is a New York City kid. Born and raised. And getting traded to the Knicks was not just a basketball move for him, it was coming home. He embodies everything the city represents, the working man who outworks everyone else in the building, the guy nobody handed anything to who shows up every day and takes it. He is a pest in the best possible way. He pressures the ball full court. He takes charges. He digs for steals. He was another journeyman before New York, bouncing around, trying to stick. And he stuck. And he hit big shots in the NBA Finals in the city he grew up in. There is no better story in this whole run than Jose Alvarado. New York City through and through.

Landry Shamet stayed when he could have left, and this team needed him for exactly what he provided. Spacing. Shooting. The willingness to let it fly without hesitation. There was a stretch in the Sixers series where he was hitting threes like he could not miss. He is not going to carry you but he is going to give you exactly what a championship team needs from a role player, hitting open shots and not making mistakes. He did both.

And one more backstory worth mentioning: Mike Brown and De'Aaron Fox. Brown coached Fox in Sacramento. They had their relationship, their history. And then Brown got fired. Some people say he was let go partly because he called Fox out. Called him out for not being a winning player, for the decisions he made, for the things that were holding that team back. Sacramento did not want to hear it. They moved on from Brown.

And then here we are. NBA Finals. Mike Brown's New York Knicks versus De'Aaron Fox's San Antonio Spurs. And Fox, the guy Brown supposedly got fired for telling the truth about, went out in this series and made some of the most boneheaded plays you will see in a Finals. The layup attempt in game four when all he had to do was dribble it out. That is the one that will follow him forever. OG blocked it. The Knicks stole the game. The series turned.

At the end of the day, Brown called it. Fox is talented. Nobody is taking that away from him. But when the moment got its biggest, the old habits showed up. The Sacramento habits. And Mike Brown, sitting on the other bench, had to know. He had seen it before. He tried to tell people. They did not want to listen.

Mike Brown was right. He just had to wait a little while for everyone else to see it.

Duce McBride had his moments too. He is young, he is hungry, and he showed up when called upon. This team had depth. Real depth. Everyone knew their role and embraced it. That is a Mike Brown team. That is a championship team.

They came close the year before. The years before that, a gritty team that couldn't get over the hump. They had a coach who believed in one way of doing things, and I loved them for it. But it was time for a change. Enter Mike Brown. Thank you, Tom Thibodeau. Now.

This year was not easy because they were figuring it out. The coach had to figure out how these guys fit together. It looked alright in the beginning. Even won the NBA Cup against this very San Antonio Spurs team. But there was a hard, tough stretch in the middle of the year where they lost eight of ten, and it was not looking great. Adversity builds character. The team grew up during that stretch, figuring out who works where and how things should go.

This team was not overexerted. Real rotations. Mike Brown made sure of it. By the time the playoffs came around, I think they knew who they were.

They tried to brute force the Hawks series at first, dropped two games by a total of two points, and went back to the drawing board. Ever since then, things changed. Blew them out to close it. All the talking heads thought they weren't going to get past Atlanta. Wrong.

Then the Sixers, who had just beaten the Boston Celtics, the probably best team in the East. Wrong again. No answers for Brunson and Towns and Anunoby. Josh Hart, all pun intended, was the heartbeat. Mikal Bridges didn't miss. Landry Shamet was hitting threes like he was channeling Steph Curry for a stretch. It was weird. It was amazing. Another sweep. Another monster closeout.

Eastern Conference Finals. The Cleveland Cavaliers. They said we had no answers for Donovan Mitchell, who finally had a real partner in James Harden. They were supposed to be too much. But we still did the thing. No OG for the first two games due to his hamstring, and it was a little scary. But this team did not blink. Another sweep. Another monster closeout. They put their heads down and went to work.

Then the Finals. The West was supposed to be the best. They had the defending champions in the Oklahoma City Thunder. But this upstart San Antonio Spurs team, with Victor Wembanyama and a bunch of super hungry, talented young guys like Stephon Castle, Dylan Harper, Keldon Johnson, Julian Champagnie, a vet who can score the lights out in De'Aaron Fox, and gritty Devin Vassell. They took the defending champions to the brink and beat them. The NBA had a Spurs problem. Which meant the Knicks had a Spurs problem.

Game one in San Antonio. What happens? The Knicks find a way. Of course they find a way. That's what they do. They went on an eleven-zero run to end that game and steal it. They were not supposed to win. Game two, also in San Antonio. Nobody expected it. The Spurs' inexperience showed and they made costly errors at the end. The Knicks held on.

Game three. New York. All the momentum on the Knicks side, and there was a lot going on in the background. The president in the building for some reason. Won't get political. The Spurs did what they had to do and won at the Garden by four, though it felt worse than that. Our first loss in about two months. It was due. Didn't like it. But it happened.

Game four. This was bad at first. Down twenty-nine at one point. Down twenty-seven at the half. The Spurs scored seventy-six points in the first half. By all intents and purposes, it was over. A lot of people thought so. But I kept the game on. We saw a comeback in game one against the Cavs. This isn't the Cavs, but there's always a chance. And they chipped and chipped and chipped away. By the end of the third, down fifteen instead of twenty-seven. I told myself, if it gets to fourteen, fifteen points, there's a chance. It happened. I was locked in.

Did I think they were actually going to win? I'm not going to sit here and lie to you. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Why would it happen now? But I wanted them to show the grit and heart that they had. And they did. What I did not anticipate was De'Aaron Fox, with possession of the ball and a lead, going for a layup instead of dribbling it out. OG blocked it. First hand of God. The Knicks got the ball back. Brunson from forty feet was a little short. And then the second hand of God. OG Anunoby tipped it home with 1.2 seconds left. Knicks win, 107-106. The biggest comeback in NBA Finals history.

This was as much a collapse as it was a comeback. But the little things they kept doing, they just kept going and going.

And then last night. Back in San Antonio. The Spurs went out to a big lead in the first quarter. The Knicks scored thirteen points in the first. Oof. But at the half, down only five. They kept grinding. The Spurs' defense was on all cylinders. It didn't feel like anything was going our way. But you know who never doubted? Jalen Brunson.

This was his legacy game. He hits a three late, there's a landing foul that could have been called on Wembanyama that would have put him out of game six. Looked like his ankle was hurt. He was on the floor for five, six seconds. Gets up. Doesn't limp for the rest of the game. Runs at the ref, gets mad, gets even, then one-ups them. That's who Jalen Brunson is.

I never thought Jalen Brunson was going to be our guy. At least not the guy. I don't think anyone did, and they would be lying to you if they said otherwise. I thought he was going to be a great piece and we just needed someone else to join him. Maybe we get KD. Maybe we get Giannis. But as it became clear that this guy was the man, we built around him. And it all worked out.

He is the leader. He is the captain. When things got tough, he put his head down and went to work. No moment is too big. That man is a cold-blooded sniper. He does it every time.

I need to address something. Every year, when the Knicks are good, you hear people talk about the celebrity fans in the Garden like it is a negative. Like it is something to mock. Let me be clear about something. That is New York City. We are not a city that has celebrities at games. We are a city where celebrities are the fans, because they are from here, they grew up here, they have been coming to these games for decades. That is not the same thing.

Spike Lee has been courtside since before most people watching these games were born. He is basically the mascot. Ben Stiller, I have been seeing him at games for thirty years. Tracy Morgan. Larry David. Adam Sandler. Fat Joe. These guys have always been there. Go look at the tape. This is not bandwagon. This is culture. New York City's culture has celebrities in it because New York City produces celebrities. It is what the city does.

Yes, you are going to see some bandwagon here and there. I am not naive. Who knew Sydney Sweeney was a Knicks fan? I have my doubts, but I am not going to question it. Let people enjoy it. But do not confuse the people showing up for the moment with the people who have always been there. Timothy Chalamet rides. He is a young one but he is genuine. These people bleed orange and blue the same way the rest of us do. The Garden is not a place people come to be seen. It is a place people come because they love this team. New York is just a city where some of those people happen to be famous. I am sorry your city does not have that.

The 2026 New York Knicks did it in every way. They won gritty games. They blew teams out. They used Karl-Anthony Towns as a facilitator. They used Jalen Brunson as the one. The defense was smothering. The buckets were timely. The coaches made adjustments. The rotations were right. It didn't matter who they were going to play.

At the end of all of it, this was the team of destiny.

And the destiny was fulfilled.

The 2026 New York Knickerbockers are NBA Champions. I'm so happy. I didn't think I would ever say that. But here we are.