To understand the depths of the day, to understand just how much this championship — and the past two months — meant to Knicks fans who’ve waited as many as 53 years for this moment of bliss, perhaps it’s best to start away from the Canyon of Heroes.
Away from the scenes and sounds broadcast on televisions and phones around the country as the franchise’s first-ever ticker-tape parade ended with Mayor Zohran Mamdani distributing keys to the city.
Perhaps it’s best to start at the corner of Park Place and Church Avenue, where Jalen Brunson jersey after Jalen Brunson jersey and orange-and-blue-clad fan after orange-and-blue-clad fan tried to decipher ways to maybe, just maybe, catch a glimpse of the Knicks. Dozens climbed up sanitation trucks, figuring out if those extra feet of height could help catch a recognizable head or two when the floats drove by. Others in the area got a quick New York City geography crash course, figuring out the direction of City Hall and coming to terms that it was either going to be tough — or there was no way at all — to see it.
These were the Knicks fans who still came, who didn’t get a spot by the barricades that some lined up for in the early hours of the morning and still joined in the joyous celebration that echoed throughout the streets of Lower Manhattan.