Madison Square Garden will be Crazy Tonight
By Greg Evans
First time in over 50 years the Knicks will be at Madison Square Garden, more or less, expected to win game 3, and push on through to the championship, and bring the Larry O’Brien Trophy back to New York. It has been such a legendary run for them, winning 13-straight post-season games, second only to the 2017 Golden State Warriors, who won 15 consecutive games. Most of the country, outside the San Antonio metropolitan area, is pushing for the Knicks to win.
The Garden tonight will be an electric place to be. President Trump has said he plans to attend. Courtside will be stacked with the young and filthy rich like Kylie Jenner, Timothee Chalamet, and Taylor Swift. You can almost picture Walter Winchell doing a live radio broadcast beside Spike Lee, as if he were at table 50 at The Stork Club. “Under the hoop, is that a horse? Winner of both the 2026 Kentucky Derby and the Belmont Stakes, Golden Tempo, who could have been the Triple Crown winner, is also in the arena for this historic NBA Finals Game 3. My question is, why didn’t he run at Preakness? Trainer Cherie DeVaux opted to skip the Preakness Stakes to rest Golden Tempo, after that 2 min race…? ‘Eh. But tonight we have, for all the Knicks fans around the world, the biggest game of many of their lives. What do you think about that Spike?!”
“Victory or else!”
For Knicks fans, the excitement of getting through the day to watch this game is a mind-bender. The nervous energy is overwhelming. I have to go out and powerwalk something fierce to calm down. I wanted a baconegg’ncheese on a roll for breakfast, but my daughter says I need to watch what I eat.
Josh Hart has been critical of the “ridiculous’ price of tickets for tonight’s finals. The ticket prices for the MSG games 3&4 have made headlines recently. Hart is frustrated that the high cost of tickets is preventing loyal fans from attending the Finals at MSG. You’re just spitting into the wind buddy. Money makes this world go ‘round, Mr. Hart. It isn’t love, it isn’t compassion, it isn’t fleeting fame, it is unadulterated greed.
A few things to keep in mind. The Knicks are beating up San Antonio, and this is with Brunson not putting up giant numbers in the finals, but he’s still the best player on the floor. Wemby, sorry Spurs fans, he’s overrated. He is good, but he has a ways to go before he can be considered a certifiable star. KAT is taking him down to the pavement. Wemby doesn’t know what to do. This 7’4” player who can dribble and shoot from the outside should be able to put up 50 a night. He is good, but not as good as the San Antonio newspapers were claiming all season. The Knicks players know their roles and play them well. If Brunson is lighting it up, then they let him. If he is having an off night or two, the guys pick up the slack. It is a study in team play, and it is Brunson’s team. Without him, it would be an entirely different team. Mike Brown is the perfect coach for this team. Yes, Patrick Ewing was bummed out being passed over yet again for a coveted Knicks coaching position. But the reality is, the Knicks front office holds a grudge against him. Why? Who knows? Maybe there are some old timers still making decisions, and while in their young executive primes back in the 1980s and 1990s, Ewing was the leader of the Knicks, and he didn’t bring home a title despite near misses and a stellar career. But that is not what is important right now. Right now, it is about the Knicks’ current players who are tearing it up, and the coaching staff who is doing a great job to keep their players focused.
Now history will look back on this team and unanimously agree that they played as a team like no one else since, like, the 1985-86 Celtics, or more recently, the Golden State Warriors in 2017.
New York needs this victory. It needs it for the city, and all those who have wonderful memories of time spent there. It needs it because the past few years have been so grim. Things haven’t really gone so well. Not since the mid to late 1990’s- did the city flourish in nearly every way, except a Knicks championship. The Yankees were winning. Crime was low. Companies were thriving. Gray’s Papaya was still on 6th Avenue. The World Trade Center still reflected those mandarin sunsets. I know all of this because I was still living there- first in The Bronx, then Manhattan. I thought I was going to live in the city forever. Each morning, trudging through the snow from my East Village apartment at 149 1st Avenue to my job at Barnes and Noble at 6th Avenue and 22nd Street. That Barnes and Noble isn’t there anymore. Getting home at night and messing with the rabbit ears, trying to get a game on TV. All that isn’t there anymore either.
I have waited my entire life for the Knicks to go the distance. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I would ever see it. Maybe that is when my cynicism first started. Or maybe it was nearly a decade of being rejected by my high school crush that did it. I wasn’t always this dark and cynical. Let’s play fair here. Maybe we can’t blame the Knicks or my crush. The cynicism could have developed on the night of October 20, 2004, when the Red Sox came back from 0-3 to beat the Yankees in the ALCS. I remembered I was down in a bar with my buddy Travis McGee, around Fulton, or Ann, or Gold Street. It was the South Street Seaport area. I can’t remember the actual location. That is a deeply repressed memory. But I remember that loss took me a long time to get over. Sports changes you if you are a pure fan. Whenever I see the Boston Red Sox logo or even the name written, I get a strange, bitter taste in my mouth. It shows me the power of the human mind. Because of 1999, I do have a distaste for the Spurs. I think the reason why I don’t swim in bitterness when I see their logo is because I wasn’t really surprised that they won back then. Disappointed, yes. But it wasn’t life-altering, in terms of my expectations getting righteously thrown into the proverbial wood chipper. You know what irks me, when I tell people that I am pumped for a game and they give me a snide, “I don’t watch sports,” or “I don’t even care.” Go board a shuttle and fly to Mars and stay there.
A couple more hours and it is on. The Knicks have to pull off this win tonight. There has been a lot of chatter by talking heads about the Spurs winning and how much they want the series to be extended. No, we don’t want it extended. We want a sweep, baby! Ho, ho!