{"id":715831,"date":"2026-06-05T00:46:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T00:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/715831\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T00:46:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T00:46:09","slug":"president-trump-confirms-he-will-attend-nba-finals-game-at-madison-square-garden-praises-victor-wembanyama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/715831\/","title":{"rendered":"President Trump confirms he will attend NBA Finals game at Madison Square Garden, praises Victor Wembanyama"},"content":{"rendered":"

President Donald Trump confirmed on Thursday he will attend an NBA Finals<\/a> game at Madison Square Garden next week, which would make him the first sitting U.S. president to attend an NBA Finals game.<\/p>\n

Trump acknowledged the possibility of attending last week when he revealed he had been invited by New York Knicks owner James Dolan to attend one of the team’s games against the San Antonio Spurs<\/a>. When asked about the matter Thursday<\/a>, Trump praised Dolan, the Knicks and Spurs star Victor Wembanyama<\/a> before confirming he would attend:<\/p>\n

“I’ve been a Knick fan for a long time, and I’m also a Jim Dolan fan. He’s a nice guy, OK? He spent a long time wanting to win and he’s a competitive guy and he’s got a team that’s amazing. I don’t think they’ve lost a playoff game. Can you imagine that?<\/p>\n

It was not looking good. I saw the beginning of the game and it wasn’t looking good. I missed the middle because I talked to generals all night long, but I watched that end of the game and they were dominant. Really amazing. “Wemby’s a great player \u2014 he’s going to be a great player and he is already a great player. I say ‘How do you guard this guy? He’s 7-foot-5 and he’s got a great shot, right?’ But they find a way to do it. They’re a great team and I’m happy for Jim because Jim has been fighting hard to produce such a team, so yes, you never know.<\/p>\n

“The answer is yes, he’s invited me and I’m going.”<\/p>\n

Small clarification: The Knicks did lose two games in the first round to the Atlanta Hawks<\/a>, but are now on a 12-game winning streak in which they’ve broken NBA records for scoring margin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"President<\/p>\n

It remains to be seen what kind of reception President Donald Trump gets from the Knicks fans who can afford NBA Finals tickets.<\/p>\n

(AP Photo\/Alex Brandon)<\/p>\n

Trump was subsequently asked which game he would attend and said Game 3 on Monday was a possibility, before joking he could go to Game 4 too:<\/p>\n

“It could be Monday \u2026 maybe I’ll do both.”<\/p>\n

NBA commissioner Adam Silver welcomed the possibility a day earlier, via ESPN’s Ben Golliver<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“President Trump is very much a New Yorker. I’m thrilled another New Yorker wants to participate in the enthusiasm and the joy around this Knicks team.”<\/p>\n

A sitting president at an NBA Finals game would be unprecedented. Trump has frequently attended sporting events as president, most notably UFC events organized by his friend, CEO Dana White. That relationship led to the creation of UFC Freedom 250, a card to be held on the White House South Lawn on June 14<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Trump’s attendance does come with increased security, though, which means Knicks fans will likely want to arrive to Madison Square Garden with plenty of time to spare. It was a similar story when Trump attended the US Open final last year<\/a>, which started late and with swaths of empty seats due to fans waiting to get past security.<\/p>\n

Considering how much money Knicks fans will be paying to attend Game 3, with a get-in price of $7,142 as of Thursday morning per Gametime<\/a>, they would not be happy with a repeat.<\/p>\n

The Knicks hold a 1-0 lead in the Finals after a 105-95 win over the Spurs on Wednesday<\/a>. This is their first trip to the Finals since 1999 and they are now three wins away from their first NBA title since 1973.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Donald Trump confirmed on Thursday he will attend an NBA Finals game at Madison Square Garden next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":715832,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[7218,64,63,2490,247008,347341,45376,590,2656,1666,188997,10549,85,12838],"class_list":["post-715831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-atlanta-hawks","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-donald-trump","tag-james-dolan","tag-knicks-fans","tag-madison-square-garden","tag-nba","tag-nba-finals","tag-new-york-knicks","tag-playoff-game","tag-san-antonio-spurs","tag-sports","tag-victor-wembanyama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/715832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}