When you love something so much and that adoration goes unrequited for more than a half a century until you suddenly receive a big, beautiful kiss, you’re bound to lose yourself. Hug a stranger. Shed a tear.
This New York Knicks championship, the first since 1973, clinched on June 13 in a 94-90 victory over the San Antonio Spurs, means everything to New Yorkers because we play this game, hoops, everywhere. On Parks Department courts, concrete cracked, rims crooked or tighter than the 5 p.m. subway or both, in community centers, and in Catholic grammar-school gyms with kitchen-tile floors and pillars in weird places, such as inbounds. The young don their first tiny jerseys, likely Knicks kits, for rec ball. The graying wrap their knees in thick white pads, still chasing Saturday-morning glory at 70. And when people from all over the United States and the world relocate here to pursue their passions, they may just join a hoops team, in the New York Urban Professionals League or the co-ed ZogSports operation, playing in some public-school fifth-floor gym or at a collection of courts near the South Street Seaport called Basketball City.
Play. The word just sounds happy. You play it, you breathe it, you live it, you love it. So you ache when your team stinks. But when all’s clicking in your basketball relationship, and you’re living among 8.5 million people, a vibe spreads, as if it were a joy germ, among friends, family, neighbors, courtside celebrities. Even those who never pick up a ball catch Knicks fever. And so Knicks fans, bright-eyed and new and long-suffering alike, gathered in Central Park and Queens pubs and Bronx bodegas, a sea of orange and blue, to shout so loud you could hear them from surrounding high-rises. The amount of Knicks gear seen on the streets jumped exponentially, as did the temptation to say “let’s go Knicks” to passersby. In a city where residents battle over borough supremacy, bagel orders, and parking spots, suddenly everyon
