In any season, it doesn’t matter if the Knicks make the playoffs or not: the world will find out about them either way.
It’s the nature of New York sports and the popularity the city gives them. Year after year, the media will include the Knicks in the conversation regardless of their record.
For most of the 21st century, the Knicks have been the laughing stock of the NBA, rarely making the playoffs but always the focus of media coverage. That has changed recently, as the Knicks emerged as one of the Eastern Conference’s best teams after decades of inactivity and mediocrity.
The franchise has made the playoffs in three of the last four seasons and is in the second round for the second straight year. Jalen Brunson & Co. can take the Knicks to heights they haven’t reached since 2000 (the Eastern Conference Finals) and 1999 (the NBA Finals).
With those two destinations in sight for New York, Jugo Mobile dives into Knicks history and details the last time the Knicks won an NBA title.
When was the last time the Knicks won the NBA Finals?
New York fans have been deprived of an NBA Finals appearance for 25 years. But they have gone without a championship for more than 50 years.
Behind a star-studded roster that included Walt Frazier, Willis Reed, Dave DeBusschere, Bill Bradley, Earl Monroe and Jerry Lucas, the Knicks won their second NBA title in 1973. The first came in 1970 with a similar roster, and perhaps the sweetest. Of all things, both victories came against the Los Angeles Lakers.
The 1973 team defeated the Lakers in five games and Reed took home his second Finals MVP trophy, becoming the first player to accomplish this feat. After a Game 1 loss in Los Angeles, the Knicks won four straight and closed out the series in Los Angeles.
Reed recorded 16.4 points and 9.2 rebounds per game in that series. Bradley led the team in scoring with 18.6 points per game, Frazier led with 5.2 assists per game and DeBusschere had a team-high 11.6 rebounds per game.
The 1973 title marked another crowning achievement for the late Hall of Famer, but Reed is best remembered for the 1970 NBA Finals.
Reed averaged 31.8 points and 15.0 rebounds per game during the first four games of the 1970 Finals. The series was tied, 2-2, and Reed tore a thigh muscle late in Game 5, which the United States won. Knicks. He missed Game 6 and was doubtful for Game 7.
That’s when “The Willis Reed Game” was born. Reed ran out of the tunnel and played in Game 7. He finished with just four points and three rebounds, but played 27 minutes despite suffering a serious thigh injury four days earlier. The Knicks won fairly easily, establishing a 27-point halftime lead.
Reed became the first player in NBA history to be named Finals MVP, regular season MVP and All-Star Game MVP in the same season. The NBA introduced the Finals MVP award in the 1969 NBA Finals.
In the years after the 1973 title, the franchise was quiet, until the Knicks selected Patrick Ewing number one overall in the 1985 NBA Draft. New York went on to make 14 consecutive playoff appearances between 1988 and 2001.
Most of those appearances ended in the Eastern Conference semifinals, but the Ewing-led team reached the NBA Finals twice, in 1994 and 1999. Both times, however, the Knicks lost.
The Knicks are still two rounds away from reaching the NBA Finals in 2024 and would likely need to defeat the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals to get there. However, the possibility is tantalizing.
Brunson has a chance to cement himself as a Knicks legend if he leads this team to the NBA Finals, a feat that has happened only eight times in franchise history and only twice since the 1970s.
