The Knicks finally got the monkey off their back in 2026, and now they’re chasing something even harder: a repeat in a league that has turned championship defense into a disappearing act.
New York’s title ended a 53-year drought, but the celebration has already started to give way to the next challenge. The regular season is less than two months away, and the message from inside the Knicks’ camp is clear: one ring is not enough.
Jordan Clarkson put that mindset front and center at his annual charity golf event for the JC Cares Foundation in San Antonio, where he spoke with local station KSAT 12. The Knicks, he said, are not just trying to savor what they did last season. They want more.
That ambition runs straight into one of the NBA’s strangest recent trends. Since the Golden State Warriors won back-to-back championships in 2017 and 2018, the league has seen a different team take the crown every year:
2019: Toronto Raptors
2020: Los Angeles Lakers
2021: Milwaukee Bucks
2022: Golden State Warriors
2023: Denver Nuggets
2024: Boston Celtics
2025: Oklahoma City Thunder
2026: New York Knicks
That’s the longest run without a repeat champion in NBA history. The previous high-water mark was six straight years, from 1975 to 1980.
It’s also been nearly a decade since anyone went back-to-back, a sharp contrast to the stretch from 1987 to 2002, when repeats - and even three-peats - were part of the league’s rhythm:
1987-1988: Los Angeles Lakers
1989-1990: Detroit Pistons
1991-1993: Chicago Bulls
1994-1995: Houston Rockets
1996-1998: Chicago Bulls
2000-2002: Los Angeles Lakers
The Lakers later did it again in 2009-2010, and the Miami Heat matched the feat in 2012-2013 before the Warriors’ run.
The Knicks are trying to break that pattern while bringing back much of the same team that won it all, with Andre Drummond stepping in as the backup center in place of Mitchell Robinson.
Clarkson’s comments fit with what others around the team have said, too. The mood is not about settling into the satisfaction of ending 53 years of frustration. It’s about chasing the feeling again.
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