Parade<\/a>. Thursday. Manhattan.\u201d<\/p>\nAt a watch party in Amagansett attended by close to 1,000 people, young fans who\u2019d never experienced a Knicks championship hugged and shouted into the night, while veterans basked in the glow. \u201cIt\u2019s a long wait, but it\u2019s sweet,\u201d said Jamie Grifo, 70, who was in 11th grade and 17 years old the last time the Knicks won a championship.<\/p>\n
Grifo, of Manhattan, now a professor and program director of the NYU Langone Fertility Center at NYU Medical Center, said he\u2019d been a fan since he was 5. \u201cYou just keep hoping each year, each year, each year,\u201d he said. \u201cYou think maybe this is the year. And guess what? This is the year!\u201d<\/p>\n
What did this win mean to the younger fans? \u201cEverything!\u201d screamed Lukas Ferraz Monteiro, 21, from Bridgehampton.<\/p>\n
His friends \u2014 Johnny Nill, Nathan Weise, Owen Caulfield and Saverir Anderson \u2014 were giddy. The men, in their early 20s, had grown up with a team that lost more games than it won. Fortunes changed with the signing of Jalen Brunson, who scored a game high 45 points Saturday night. \u201cI love that guy,\u201d one of them said. \u201cKing of NY.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nill, 22, of Sag Harbor, said he\u2019d always believed. \u201cNever doubted it,\u201d he said. \u201cKnicks all day \u2014 come on, let\u2019s go!\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"On](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1781426229_51_image.jpeg\"\/)
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On the East End, Matias Mesa, 11, showed his Knicks pride at Amagansett Square\u2019s watch party. Credit: Justin Girshon<\/p>\n
Earlier in the night, Matias Mesa, 11, from East Hampton and wearing a Brunson jersey, said he was looking forward to a win. \u201cA lot,\u201d Mesa said of how much a Knicks title would mean.\u00a0\u201cI would be really excited.\u201d<\/p>\n
At a watch party at Prime on the Mile, a restaurant on Freeport\u2019s Nautical Mile, Tunishia Martinez wept. Martinez, 40, from Southside\u00a0Jamaica, Queens, said she was thinking of her father and brother, devoted fans who were not alive to take in the win. \u201cThis just felt like the team just hugged us all,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Bryan Martin, 46, of Queens, also celebrating at the restaurant, said he was feeling emotions “pretty close” to what he felt when his son was born.<\/p>\n
“I never thought I’d see this day,” Martin said. “We’re not losers tonight, we’re winners, we’re champions.”<\/p>\n
Shawn Page, 56, of South Merrick, said the win would \u201cbring a lot of people closer and again, give a sense of unity and just make everybody feel like how New York used to feel.\u201d<\/p>\n
By early Sunday morning, the scene on Long Island Rail Road trains bearing fans east from Penn Station was quieter. Sweaty fans slumped into their chairs on the Long Beach just after 1 a.m.<\/p>\n
That was until William West and Rannie Battle reminded their fellow passengers why they ventured all the way into Manhattan. \u201cI can die happy now,\u201d Battle said. \u201cMy Knicks got the ‘ship, baby. That\u2019s why.\u201d<\/p>\n
After\u00a0the game clock ticked to zero, not everyone went home or into the streets;\u00a0some went shopping. Long lines formed outside at least two\u00a0DICK’s\u00a0Sporting Goods stores on Long Island. Before the game even started, the chain had announced a plan to reopen stores on Long Island and elsewhere in the tristate area \u201cimmediately\u201d to sell gear after a Knicks Game 5 win.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve been getting shipments of upwards of 20 boxes almost every day, and they’re gone within the day,\u201d said Sean McCourt, a front end manager at DICK\u2019s Commack. \u201cIt\u2019s been a madhouse.\u201d<\/p>\n
Newsday’s Matthew Chayes, Alek Lewis, Bahar Ostadan, Ashna Balroop, Justin Girshon and\u00a0Angelina Livigni contributed to this story.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"Nicholas](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1781426229_305_image.jpeg\"\/)
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\n\tNicholas Spangler is a general assignment reporter and has worked at Newsday since 2010.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York yawped, from the packed sweaty bars around Madison Square Garden to watch parties at the Freeport…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266247,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[8015,9,1104,56,63,65,64,8016],"class_list":["post-266246","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-nassau","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-knicks","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-suffolk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266246","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266246"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266246\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266246"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266246"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266246"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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