Analysis by Dana O’Neil, CNN
(CNN) — Once it was everything – a city rivalry that ran so deep it cleaved families in two. But by the time Villanova went to Broad Street to play Temple in 2017, the Wildcats had entirely disassembled the Big 5, turning it into their own personal playground.
Villanova would toss the Owls aside by 20 for its 22nd consecutive win against their Philly opponents, a walkover victory that barely moved the needle anywhere outside of the city limits.
But the Temple fans were there for a piece of flesh as much as a victory, eager to rip into then-sophomore Jalen Brunson because he chose Villanova over Temple, where his father, Rick, played under John Chaney. They called him a traitor and chanted that his father sucked. They cussed and catcalled every time he touched the ball. For every bad thing they had to say, he wordlessly drained a bucket.
By the time the night ended, not only had Villanova won; Brunson had 31.
Nine years later in a game that meant only everything, Victor Wembayama crowded into Brunson’s landing space on a 3-pointer during the third quarter of Game 5 of the NBA Finals. Refs opted to disregard the blatant flagrant foul and the usually stoic Brunson erupted, chasing after the officials before turning on his heel in a fury and returning to the bench. The Knicks at the time trailed the Spurs, 55-50 with 6:27 in the third.
Over the next 18 minutes, Brunson would score 24 of his 45 points to lead New York out of the history books and into the present. Denizens of the city that bills itself as basketball’s epicenter and renters of the World’s Most Famous Arena, the Knicks finally are the center of the sport’s universe once again: NBA champions for the first time in 53 years.
With New York greats including Patrick Ewing and Charles Oakley watching from the stands, Brunson shoved them all aside, etching his name as the greatest Knickerbocker of all time with a heroic effort that even managed to erase Willis Reed from the record books.
At 29 years old, Brunson now has two college championships, a collection of National Player of the Year Awards, an NBA title, an NBA Finals MVP crown and the core of the Big Apple for eternity.
“I have no words,’’ an overcome Brunson told ESPN’s Lisa Salters after the game, his eyes welling with tears. “It’s everything I ever dreamed of. I don’t know what I’m feeling. I’m just, like, in awe.’’
The Knicks won because Brunson willed them to, not just in this game but in this season. He did what a team captain is supposed to do, imposing his personality on them. He turned a team gifted all of the advantages of being a professional athlete in New York City can offer into a group of underdogs, convincing them to believe in something greater than themselves. They absorbed his energy and assumed his persona, opting for grit and gumption over finesse and flair.
The Knicks trailed in every single game against San Antonio and were down as many as 10 in the fourth quarter of Game 5. Karl Anthony Towns fouled out. Landry Shamet left with a gimpy leg. Mitchell Robinson has one serviceable hand.
And yet they won, giving the young Spurs a lesson in the value of being an oldhead.
“Whenever someone counted us out, we found a way to do something about it,’’ Brunson said after the game.
Seeing the wires
That’s the crux of it all – of Brunson and now by extension, the Knicks.
If you just ran the numbers, San Antonio was the better team. The Spurs led for more minutes than the Knicks and built seemingly unconquerable leads. They lost one game on a turnover and another on a tip in. You could easily make a case, in fact, that San Antonio should have won every game that they lost.
Except it didn’t go that way, because San Antonio knew how to play games and Brunson taught the Knicks how to win them.
It’s funny really. Years ago, back when he was the head coach at Xavier, Chris Mack joked that if you yanked off Brunson’s face, you’d expose the wires. It might be more accurate to opine if he is more Secretariat than cyborg, gifted with an oversized heart that never stops beating.
How else to explain such relentlessness, such a refusal to stop even when most everyone would quit? Brunson is at his best when everything is at its worst, blessed with belief that seems at times desperate and determination that can feel almost manic.
It is a learned behavior, to be certain, taught first by an NBA journeyman father who never let his son forget that dreams were hard to realize, and then by a college coach who refused to reward him just because he came to school with a bunch of stars next to his name.
But it is also how he’s veined as well as wired.
Years ago, then-assistant coach Mikie Nardi was asked to rank Brunson in the pantheon of great Villanova guards.
“He has the calmness of Randy Foye, the toughness of Kyle Lowry, the energy of Scottie Reynolds and the competitiveness of Ryan Arcidiacono,’’ said Nardi, naming in order an All-American, first-round pick, All-American and Final Four most outstanding player.
To which head coach Jay Wright added, “Yeah. And he’s more mature than all of them.’’
It’s like he was both made and built to absorb the enormity of being the captain of the New York Knicks. Blessed with both the stoicism to handle the pressure and the energy to fuel the want, he also simultaneously crafted identity for a team of assembled parts (none of the Knicks started their careers in New York).
Late Saturday night, when 53 years of waiting finally ended, when every borough of New York erupted in cathartic joy and his teammates celebrated on the court, cameras caught Brunson giving a little fist pump before he walked down the bench to hug Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson. It felt reminiscent, actually, of Wright’s stone-bold “bang” when Kris Jenkins drained the 3-point buzzer-beater to win the national title in 2016.
Brunson then found his father, now an assistant with the Knicks. The two embraced and Rick dropped a kiss on his boy’s forehead.
Then and only then did Brunson wrap his head in a towel, double over at the waist and start crying.
The captain’s work was finally done.
The-CNN-Wire
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