New York Knicks Win NBA Championship 2026
Nikhil Mehta
The New York Knicks are NBA champions. For the first time since 1973, the Larry O’Brien Trophy is coming back to Madison Square Garden. On Saturday night in San Antonio, the Knicks erased a 16-point deficit in Game 5, pulled off yet another comeback, and beat the Spurs 94-90 to close out the series 4-1. The city of New York erupted. Every Knicks fan alive has waited their entire life for this moment. The drought is over.
This was not a team that survived. This was a team that refused to die, over and over again, until their opponent had nothing left.
The Knicks trailed by double digits in all five Finals games. Let that sink in. Against one of the most talented young teams in the league, featuring the 7-foot-4 superstar Victor Wembanyama, New York spotted the Spurs a lead in every single contest and still won four of them.
They finished the playoffs 16-3. They won 15 of their last 16 games, including nine straight road wins. At one point during the postseason they won 13 consecutive games.
Here is what that kind of run actually means: the Knicks were not getting lucky. They were the better team, and they proved it the hard way.
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Here is how every game played out across the full championship series:
| Game | Winner | Score | The Moment That Defined It |
|---|---|---|---|
| Game 1 | Knicks | 105–95 | Strong road start Knicks set the tone early in San Antonio |
| Game 2 | Knicks | 105–104 | One-point nail-biter escape another road win on the wire |
| Game 3 | Spurs | 115–111 | The Spurs avoid the sweep the only Knicks loss in the final 16 games |
| Game 4 | Knicks | 107–106 | Largest comeback in Finals history OG Anunoby tip-in with 1.2 seconds left after trailing by 29 |
| Game 5 | Knicks | 94–90 | Brunson scores 45 points, 10 straight in the 4th quarter clinches the title on the road |
The Knicks won 4-1, trailed by double digits in every game, won nine consecutive road playoff games, and went 16-3 overall in the 2026 postseason.
With less than eight minutes left in the fourth quarter Saturday night, the Knicks were down 83-73. San Antonio’s crowd smelled blood. Then Jalen Brunson scored 10 straight points by himself. Ten straight. By himself. In a road elimination-pressure situation, with the entire series on the line.
His 12-foot jumper with 1:05 to play gave New York a 90-88 lead. The Knicks never trailed again. Final score: 94-90. Brunson finished with 45 points, going 14-for-27 from the field and 13-for-16 from the free throw line. He scored 29 points in the second half and 15 in the fourth quarter alone. The rest of the roster combined for just 49 points.
He was named Finals MVP, and nobody argued.
“I don’t know what I’m feeling,” Brunson said afterward, fighting back tears. “Whenever someone counted us out, we found a way to come back and do something about it.”
That quote tells the whole story of this team.
Before Game 5 can even be fully appreciated, you have to understand what happened in Game 4. The Knicks trailed by 29 points. In the NBA Finals. That is not a hole you climb out of. Not at this level. Not against a team playing at home with everything to lose.
New York climbed out anyway.
With 1.2 seconds left, OG Anunoby tipped in a missed shot to give the Knicks a 107-106 win. It was the largest comeback in NBA Finals history. And it broke the Spurs psychologically. They led by 16 again in Game 5 and the same thing happened. Their young stars, including Wembanyama and rookie Dylan Harper, simply could not hold a lead against a team that does not believe in deficits.
Jalen Brunson was the engine, but this championship had a full crew. Here is what each key player brought to this title run:
Coach Mike Brown built a rotation that could survive foul trouble, cold shooting nights, and massive deficits, and still find a way to win. That is the mark of a championship staff.
The last time the Knicks won an NBA championship, Richard Nixon was in the White House. The Knicks beat the Lakers in five games in 1973 behind Willis Reed, Walt Frazier, and Dave DeBusschere.
Every fan old enough to remember that team has spent five decades waiting. Most Knicks fans alive today have never seen their team win a title. The ones under 27 have never even seen New York in the NBA Finals. The last trip was in 1999, when they lost to those same San Antonio Spurs.
There is a layer to this championship that goes beyond basketball. New York is one of the biggest sports markets in the world. The Knicks have one of the most loyal and long-suffering fanbases in professional sports. Saturday night was not just a win. It was the end of something painful and the start of something new.
Every article has focused on the comeback, on Brunson, on the 53-year drought. The detail that keeps getting buried is this: the Knicks are the first team in NBA history to win both the Emirates NBA Cup and the NBA Championship in the same season or overall.
Back on December 16, they beat these same Spurs 124-113 to win the NBA Cup. They trailed in that game too and came back to win. Brunson said after that earlier victory that they were going to find a way and fight and not quit.
Six months later, word for word, that is exactly what happened on the biggest stage the sport has. This is not coincidence. This is identity.
The celebration outside Madison Square Garden was electric and, in some areas, chaotic. Fans flooded Times Square, climbed scaffolding and light poles, and stood on top of school buses. Fireworks went off over Brooklyn and Central Park. Strangers hugged each other on the street. Police officers shouted “Let’s go Knicks” over loudspeakers in Brooklyn.
There were also arrests and incidents, which prompted Knicks owner James Dolan to interrupt Josh Hart’s post-game press conference in San Antonio to urge fans to stay safe. Mayor Zohran Mamdani called on New Yorkers to celebrate responsibly. President Donald Trump, a self-described Knicks fan who attended Game 3, posted his congratulations on Truth Social and called Brunson a newly born superstar.
A ticker-tape parade down the Canyon of Heroes is scheduled for Thursday, June 18. The last time the Knicks got one of those, it was 1973.
The Knicks are 2026 NBA champions. With Brunson in his prime, a deep and battle-tested roster, and championship chemistry now locked in, this team is not built for a one-year run. The question the rest of the league is already asking is a simple one: can anyone stop them next year?
For now, none of that matters. New York waited 53 years. The parade is Thursday. Every person in blue and orange has earned every second of this.
