Knicks Win 2026 NBA Finals: Spike Lee, Timothée Chalamet and Ben Stiller Celebrate Historic Championship
GETTY IMAGES
The New York Knicks ended a 53-year championship drought with a 94-90 Game 5 win over the San Antonio Spurs, turning a long-awaited title into a full-blown cultural moment for New York and its most famous fans.
The New York Knicks are NBA champions for the first time since 1973, and New York is celebrating like it has been waiting more than half a century for exactly this moment.
The Knicks defeated the San Antonio Spurs 94-90 in Game 5 of the 2026 NBA Finals on Saturday night in Texas, clinching the franchise’s third championship and ending one of the longest title droughts in American sports. Jalen Brunson, who was named Finals MVP, delivered a defining performance with 45 points, helping New York close out the series 4-1 and finally bring the Larry O’Brien Trophy back to the city.
For Knicks fans, the win was about more than one game. It was a release. The franchise had not reached the NBA Finals since 1999, when it also faced the Spurs and lost in five games. This time, history reversed itself. A generation of New Yorkers who had only known the Knicks through heartbreak, false starts, tabloid chaos, rebuilding seasons and decades of waiting finally got the ending they had imagined for years.
GETTY IMAGES
That emotional weight was visible immediately after the final buzzer. Spike Lee and Timothée Chalamet were shown celebrating on the court after the win, with Chalamet embracing Knicks star Karl-Anthony Towns and telling ESPN’s SportsCenter, “Way rather this than the Oscars.” The line instantly captured the absurd joy of the moment: one of Hollywood’s biggest young stars, a two-time recent Best Actor contender, making it very clear that a Knicks championship meant more than any awards-season validation.
GETTY IMAGES
Ben Stiller, another longtime Knicks regular, was also caught up in the celebration while wearing a Knicks 2026 NBA Champions shirt. After years of documenting the team’s Finals run on his iPhone and showing up alongside other celebrity fans throughout the postseason, Stiller described the moment as one of the happiest of his life. For a franchise so closely tied to New York’s entertainment identity, the sight of Lee, Chalamet and Stiller all making the trip to San Antonio only reinforced how much this championship belonged to the city’s cultural imagination as well as its basketball history.
GETTY IMAGES
Karl-Anthony Towns shared an emotional embrace with fiancée Jordyn Woods, who had brought her lucky orange purse to Game 5. Walt “Clyde” Frazier, a member of the Knicks’ 1973 championship team, was also in attendance, along with Patrick Ewing, creating a living bridge between the franchise’s last title era, its most painful near-miss generation and the team that finally finished the job.
GETTY IMAGES
The celebration was not limited to the arena. Because the Knicks clinched the title in San Antonio rather than at Madison Square Garden, the Frost Bank Center cleared out quickly as Spurs fans processed the loss. Back home, however, New York erupted. Watch parties in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens turned into citywide celebrations, while fans across the five boroughs wore orange and blue, filled the streets and celebrated a championship many had never seen in their lifetime. Reuters reported that celebrations broke out across the city after the win, with Mayor Zohran Mamdani also announcing plans for a championship parade.
GETTY IMAGES
The celebrity turnout throughout the Finals turned the series into one of the biggest sports-and-entertainment crossovers of the year. In addition to Lee, Chalamet and Stiller, longtime Knicks fans Tracy Morgan and John Turturro made the trip to San Antonio for Game 5. Sydney Sweeney and Scooter Braun were also photographed supporting the Knicks, while Dave Chappelle, Chris Rock, Pete Davidson, Adam Sandler, Jay-Z, Jimmy Fallon, Michael J. Fox, Larry David, Jerry Seinfeld, Mariska Hargitay and Taylor Swift were among the major names spotted courtside during the series.
GETTY IMAGES
Mariska Hargitay, a passionate Knicks fan and close friend of Jalen Brunson, became part of the Finals storyline herself after racing to Madison Square Garden for Game 4 following two Broadway performances of ‘Every Brilliant Thing.’ Her reaction to the Knicks’ record comeback in that game captured the emotional delirium of the entire run. Game 4 saw New York complete the greatest comeback in NBA Finals history, rallying from a massive deficit to beat San Antonio 107-106 before finishing the job two nights later in Texas.
GETTY IMAGES
Even the political world briefly found common ground in the Knicks’ victory. Former President Barack Obama congratulated Coach Mike Brown, Brunson, OG Anunoby and the team after the win, while the White House also posted a message congratulating Knicks owner James Dolan and the franchise. In a moment when almost nothing feels bipartisan, apparently a Knicks championship still had the power to produce rare shared applause.
Dolan acknowledged the length of the wait after hoisting the Larry O’Brien Trophy, telling New York that he was sorry it took so long and expressing hope that it would not take that long again. The comment landed because every Knicks fan understood the scale of the drought. Fifty-three years is not just a sports statistic. It is generations of fandom, families, heartbreak, inherited loyalty and city pride passed down through seasons that rarely ended this way.
POPULAR ON THE CINEMA GROUP
The Knicks’ championship also gives Brunson a permanent place in New York sports history. His Game 5 performance was not merely great; it was legacy-defining. Reuters reported that Brunson scored 45 points, including 29 in the second half, and helped the Knicks overcome another double-digit deficit to clinch the title. After years of debate over whether New York had its true franchise star, that argument is over.
GETTY IMAGES
The 2026 NBA Finals began as a rematch of 1999. It ended as something much bigger: a citywide release, a celebrity-packed spectacle, a generational sports moment and the night the Knicks finally stopped being defined by what they had not won.
For Spike Lee, Timothée Chalamet, Ben Stiller, Myself and millions of New Yorkers, the wait is over!
The Knicks are champions again!!!!!!!
| FEATURES | INTERVIEWS | REVIEWS | The Catalogue | TRENDING | TRAILERS | VIDEOS |
