Knicks in '26: The Long Road to Victory Part I
In my experience as a sports fan, I've learned that long championship droughts rarely end quietly. As a Yankee fan, I have a painful reminder of this. As a Knicks fan, I now know that cheering on your favorite team in the midst of it is the pinnacle of sports fandom. A playoff record win streak, a double-digit comeback in the 4th quarter seemingly every game, impossible last-second plays, overcoming unfair advantages, and an unparalleled celebration to put a bow on it. There's simply nothing like it.
But part of what makes it so satisfying is the long, dark, dreary road that was navigated to get there. I wasn't alive for all of the 53 years between Knicks championships. However, I gained a deep appreciation for the Knicks' ineptitude in the time that I was around for. Among the rare near misses, there was a whole lot of frustration when it came to Knickerbocker basketball.
I'd say I became a truly aware and articulate fan of the Knicks around 10 years old and have followed them closely ever since. In order to give a peek into what the bumpy road to a championship was like, here's a brief note on the first 17 of 33 championship-less Knicks seasons that I experienced with my eyes wide open. The other 16 will come in a later post.
1992-1993
The Knicks faced the Bulls in the playoffs for the third season in a row, but this one was different. They won 60 games in the regular season, were the top seed in the East, and were poised to prevent a Chicago three-peat in the conference finals. With the series tied 2-2 the Knicks trailed by one point but had the ball on their home court and just a few seconds left on the clock. Naturally, the ball found Patrick Ewing, who stumbled at the top of the key and managed to get the ball to forward Charles Smith directly under the basket. Smith had not one, not two, not three, but four point-blank chances to give the Knicks a 3-2 lead in the series and missed them all. They never recovered and lost the series in six. This started my lifelong hatred of Michael Jordan. Unlike most Knicks fans, I still don't hate Charles Smith.
1993-1994
Jordan's first retirement cleared the way for the Knicks' first Finals run since 1973. There they met a great Houston Rockets team led by NBA MVP Hakeem Olajuwon. It was a hard-fought seven game series that New York could have won. John Starks - the Knicks' rags to riches all-star guard - went ice cold in Game Seven, shooting an abysmal 2-for-18, missing all 11 three-pointers he attempted. Knicks' coach Pat Riley caught a lot of flak for not replacing Starks with veteran Rolando Blackman at some point during the game. Blackman had played a total of 34 unmeaningful minutes in the playoffs up to that point. I still don't hate John Starks.
1994-1995
At this point the Knicks-Bulls rivalry had cooled significantly while the budding Knicks-Pacers rivalry reached a rolling boil. The two met in the Eastern Conference semifinals and duked it out for seven games. With five seconds left in the series, the Knicks had the ball on their home court down by two. Patrick Ewing received the ball at the top of the key and lumbered his way to within a few feet of the basket for a finger roll that seemed to be half-way through the rim before it popped out. I remember watching this game with my dad to my left, wearing nice clothes while sitting on my grandparents' couch in Flushing on a Sunday afternoon and being very sad. I still don't hate Patrick Ewing.
1995-1996
Pat Riley infamously resigned as Knicks coach via fax before the season so he could take over the Miami Heat. Naming Don Nelson as his replacement was an interesting experiment that didn't really work. Riley's protégé Jeff Van Gundy took over at the end of the regular season, but it was too late. Michael Jordan was comfortably back in the NBA and met the Knicks in the Eastern Conference semifinals. The Bulls made short work of it, winning in five games.
1996-1997
For the first time in a long time, the Knicks gave their roster a significant overhaul, swapping out Anthony Mason, Derek Harper, and Hubert Davis while bringing in Larry Johnson, Allan Houston, and Chris Childs. The real story, though, is a brand new rivalry. A bigger, badder, and better one than the recent vintages with the Bulls and Pacers. Pat Riley's Heat met the Knicks in the Eastern Conference Semifinals and trailed 3-1 heading into Game Five. During that game, Charlie Ward - a short man by basketball standards - attempted to box out Heat forward P.J. Brown by getting lower than Brown would have liked after a free throw. Brown responded with a textbook gutwrench suplex and a melee ensued. When the dust settled, the Heat won the game and the NBA suspended Patrick Ewing, Larry Johnson, Allan Houston, and John Starks one game each (staggered over the next two games) for having the audacity to leave the bench area during the altercation. Naturally, the Knicks lost the series. I think I still hate Pat Riley.
1997-1998
In December of 1997 my parents won two tickets to the Knicks-Mavericks game at Madison Square Garden on December 22, 1997. They gave them to me and my brother as we had never attended a Knicks game before. Merry Christmas! On December 20, 1997, Patrick Ewing suffered a broken wrist, the first significant injury of his career. Bah Humbug! Despite missing the Big Fella, the Knicks got revenge over the Heat in the first round of the playoffs. The highlight this time was a fight that broke out between Alonzo Mourning and Larry Johnson that hilariously included the diminutive Jeff Van Gundy attaching himself to Mourning's left leg like a petulant toddler. The Knicks had nothing left for the second round against their old rivals in Indiana, which they lost in five games.
1998-1999
More roster churn prior to this strike-shortened season, but this time it really hurt. Charles Oakley - my favorite ever basketball player - was sent to Toronto for Marcus Camby and fan-favorite John Starks was traded to the Warriors for the controversial Latrell Sprewell, who was coming off a record suspension for choking his head coach. The regular season was a struggle, but the new pieces began to gel in the playoffs. Faced with being the eighth seed in the East and more injuries for Patrick Ewing, Camby and Sprewell sparked an improbable run to the NBA Finals where the Duncan/Robinson Spurs handled them easily. The feature presentation, though, was another hard fought series in the opening round against the top-seeded Miami Heat. Allan Houston's runner from the elbow in Game Five to win the series remained my greatest Knicks memory until 2026. When the shot finally fell I ran up and down the hallway in my childhood home in Lake Ronkonkoma a half dozen times, screaming like a madman. My brother jumped up and down in place in the living room, and my dog Mickey lost his mind along with us, even though he had no idea why.
1999-2000
Another season, another tough playoff series with the Heat that goes the distance. For the third season in a row, the Knicks come out on top. However, they can't handle the Pacers in the conference finals. Patrick Ewing is now 37 years old, frequently injured, and making a ton of money.
2000-2001
Boom goes the dynamite. Patrick Ewing is traded for...Glen Rice? In reality, it was a massive four-team deal and the Knicks got a bunch more players and a few draft picks back too, but Rice was the only thing of real substance coming back in return. With all due respect to Rice - who was a very good player in his prime and had just been a useful contributor to a Lakers championship - it felt a lot like the moment where Paulie hands a desperate Henry Hill $3,000 at the end of Goodfells. He was a 33-year old swingman joining a team whose two best players were 30-year old swingmen. The Knicks traded their franchise icon for redundancy. In a first round playoff series against the Toronto Raptors they completely blow the final two games and go home early.
2001-2002
Really bad roster decisions become a trend! GM Scott Layden turns the Glenn Rice mistake into Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley, two rotational players on bloated, long-term contracts. He adds to the mess by signing Clarence Weatherspoon to a long, bloated contract using the mid-level exception and tops it off with a way-above-market-value $100 million extension for Allan Houston. These moves will haunt the Knicks for years to come. It only takes Jeff Van Gundy 19 games to recognize that his roster makes no sense and is too financially restricted to improve. He wisely ditches the Knicks before a long, cold winter. They finish dead last in the Atlantic Division. For the first time in my life it's becoming difficult to be a Knicks fan.
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2002-2003
Layden tries to polish his finely crafted turd by trading the oft-injured big man Marcus Camby for power forward Antonio McDyess, who missed 72 games the prior season with a knee injury. McDyess was actually pretty durable prior to that, so if you squint it might make sense. That October, he suffered a season-ending injury in the same knee during an exhibition game. I'll remember this season for the occasional heater from Latrell Sprewell and a career season from Allan Houston. The Knicks finish second to last in the Atlantic.
2003-2004
In the offseason Layden trades Knicks' fan favorite Latrell Sprewell for Keith Van Horn because of course he does. He doesn't make it to Christmas as Isiah Thomas is hired as his replacement. I was genuinely excited about this development, ha! Thomas makes a ton of trades with the financial responsibility of MC Hammer in the early 90's, sinking the Knicks deeper into salary cap hell for a longer period of time. One of them, though, brings Brooklyn's own Stephon Marbury to New York. In the moment I think that the presence of the 26-year old All-Star is enough to get the Knicks back into the playoffs, and I'm right. They get swept by the Nets in the first round.
2004-2005
In his first full season with the Knicks Marbury is every bit the star he was expected to be. However, the team around him is too disjointed and ever-changing to convert his great play into wins. They finish well out of playoff contention.
2005-2006
Thomas makes a big splash hiring Larry Brown as head coach, seemingly unaware that Marbury and Brown butted heads during the 2004 Summer Olympics. The pair were largely responsible for the only non-Gold finish for a USA men's basketball team in the Dream Team era. Brown and Marbury publicly feud to the press all season. More bad signings and bad trades have the roster nearing rock bottom. At points during the season, Brown hilariously chooses his lineup by starting a guy if they were playing near his hometown. In a far less hilarious development, in January 2006 a sexual harassment case is filed against Thomas and the Knicks by a former employee. The front office - including owner James Dolan - are exposed as routinely exhibiting reprehensible, buffoonish behavior. The Knicks finish with the worst record in the Eastern Conference. It's officially unbearable to be a Knicks fan.
2006-2007
Thomas fires Larry Brown who walks away laughing with a pile of cash the size of Scrooge McDuck's. In his infinite wisdom, Thomas hires himself as head coach and installs the "Eddy Curry" offense. Curry - a very large man who can't do most of the things that very large men should do on a basketball court - scores a bunch of points in the post but it doesn't really matter because Thomas keeps making bad trades and everybody still stinks. Actually, that's not true. David Lee averages a double-double off the bench! The Knicks finish in whatever place and can't even take advantage of a high draft pick probably because of some stupid trade two years prior.
2007-2008
Amazingly, Thomas is still allowed to be in charge of most things for the Knicks, including coaching the team. On the court, the Knicks continue to be an abomination. David Lee, tiny Nate Robinson, and the energetic Renaldo Balkman are fun to watch sometimes. But Knicks games are mostly Zach Randolph and Jamal Crawford having a contest to see who can take the most ill-advised shot. By the end of the season the Knicks hire Donnie Walsh - a grown-up human being - to take over basketball operations from Isiah Thomas. It was only four years too late. They also confirm that Thomas won't be back as coach, but WILL stick around as a consultant! James Dolan's combination of stupidity, stubbornness, and incompetence is unparalleled.
2008-2009
The team is still awful, but two very important things happen. Walsh hires Mike D'Antoni - a mature adult who actively thinks and strategizes about basketball - as head coach. Walsh also starts making trades, but not the way that Isiah Thomas did. He mostly trades long, bad contracts for short, bad contracts with an eye on having enough cap space for two max-contract players from the all-time great free agency class coming up in 2010. For the first time in a while, there's hope for the Knicks. Around this time I start regularly reading Posting and Toasting, which was operated at the time by the incomparable Seth Rosenthal. Seth was smart enough to articulate and critique what the Knicks were doing on and off the court, young enough to do it with boundless enthusiasm and optimism, and funny enough to make me laugh out loud occasionally. I'm not exaggerating when I say that Seth was the biggest reason I stayed a Knicks fan for a few of these dark years. Thanks for being the Kevin to my Whitney, Seth. <3
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