For many reasons, it's hard to think of many better NBA Finals pairings than the Knicks versus Spurs one we're about to be treated to.
The Spurs feature a generational talent in Victor Wembanyama, who might already be the best all-around player in the NBA. He's paired with a roster chock full of exciting, young players like Stephon Castle, Dylan Harper, and De'Aaron Fox. But then you have a Knicks team that's riding an 11-game postseason winning streak, which only two other teams have ever done. They have an underdog point guard in Jalen Brunson, but a complementary core of players who have been stars on previous teams, like Karl-Anthony Towns, OG Anunoby, and Mikail Bridges.
On top of that, you have the championship narratives. The Spurs had an over 15-year dynasty that saw them win five NBA titles behind a Hall of Fame corps, with a Hall of Fame coach, who helped popularize an entire style of play people called "The Beautiful Game." That dynastic run kicked off by beating the New York Knicks in the 1999 NBA Finals. It was the first championship in Spurs franchise history and their beginning as a basketball powerhouse.
However, after the 2016-17 NBA season ended, the Spurs never won more than 48 games, had made the playoffs only twice, and came into this season after six straight losing seasons.
Meanwhile, the Knicks came into that 1999 season on the tail-end of a tremendous run of success. Including that season, they had made the playoffs in 12 straight seasons, including advancing to at least the Eastern Conference semi-finals in eight straight years. They had won 50 games or more in six of those seasons and had finished first or second in their division for seven straight years. Yet, they had never won a title.
There was the 1997 team that won 57 games in the regular season but blew a 3-1 series lead to the Heat in the Eastern Conference semi-finals. There was the 1994 loss to the NBA Finals to the Rockets in a seven-game series. There was the 1993 loss to the Bulls in the Eastern Conference Finals that is famously known as the Charles Smith series. In fact, the Knicks team that made the Finals in 1999 wasn't even one of their better teams. They were 27-23 in the lockout-shortened season and were an 8th seed in the Eastern Conference.
Still, they had a chance to claim the ultimate prize and came up short. It was the last time the Knicks advanced to the NBA title game until this season. Which means, in order to reach a height the franchise hasn't seen since 1973, they'll have to beat the team that ruined their last chance. A team that's trying to start a brand new dynasty against an opponent that helped them kickstart the old one.
So how do these two teams match up as we head into Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals, and is that anywhere close to how they matched up back in 1999?
Center
1999: David Robinson (Spurs) vs Marcus Camby (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
We have to start by saying that this should have been Robinson versus Patrick Ewing, but Ewing missed the entire finals with a severe Achilles tendon injury. He was no longer an elite player in 1999, but he had averaged 17.3 points and almost 10 rebounds per game in the regular season and would have given Robinson a bit of a tougher time. Many people think of Marcus Camby as simply a dominant college player at UMASS, but the 6'11" center, who was the number two pick in the 1996 NBA Draft was a better NBA player than many people give him credit for. Still, this was not particularly close. Even though David Robinson was 33 years old in the 1999 NBA Finals, he was still a force. In the five-game series against the Knicks, he averaged 16.6 points, 11.8 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and 3.0 blocks per game. He physically dominated Camby, who was nine years younger but no match for Robinson's strength. Camby did average 2.0 blocks per game in that series, to go along with 9.6 points and 7.8 rebounds, but he couldn't hold a candle to Robinson.
2026: Victor Wembanyama (Spurs) vs Karl-Anthony Towns (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
The Wembanyama and Towns battle would be a little closer to what we would have gotten from Robinson versus Ewing. However, instead of both big men being Hall of Fame centers at the tail end of their careers, this matchup features two centers who are in their prime and have changed the way the position is played. Towns is a perennial All-Star who spaces the floor and scores in ways most centers can’t. While Wembanyama is a 7'5" anomaly who does things on a basketball court we’ve never seen a player his size do before. Towns has been electric for the Knicks this off-season, operating as the hub of their offense, but Wembanyama is easily the more impactful player of the two by virtue of the fact that he is far and away the most impactful defender in the entire league and can score in a multitude of ways on the offensive end. How the Knicks defend him, or if they can, will be the biggest storyline in this NBA Finals matchup.
Power Forward
1999: Tim Duncan (Spurs) vs Larry Johnson (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
People forget what a force Grandmama, er, Larry Johnson was when he entered the league as the No. 1 pick out of UNLV. However, by this point in his career, Johnson was more of a solid NBA starter at the four, averaging 12 points and 5.8 boards per game — and in this series, he was playing through a knee sprain and was not himself. Johnson was no match for Duncan, who was only two years into his Hall of Fame career and was already third in MVP voting that season, scoring 21.7 points with 11.4 boards a game. Duncan dominated the series, averaging 27.4 points and 14 boards a game on his way to being named Finals MVP.
2026: Julian Champagnie (Spurs) vs OG Anunoby (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: KNICKS
Back in 1999, basketball fans might have scoffed at the idea that two 6'7" players would be the starting power forwards on the two NBA Finals teams, but this is a different game in the modern NBA. OG Anunoby has been critical to the Knicks' run to the Finals, and he will be huge in this series because he will spend time guarding Wembanyama at points (Anunoby is the kind of physical, strong, and quick forward who gives Wemby as much trouble as anyone). Anunoby's two-way play has been key to the Knicks' run, and they need him to continue at that level this series. Do not sleep on Brooklyn-born, St. John’s alumni Champagnie to impact the series — he has six 3-pointers and 20 points in Game 7 against the Thunder. He is fearless, an elite shooter, and a plus defender — New York can't just hide someone on him, and he defends up.
Small Forward
1999: Sean Elliott (Spurs) vs Latrell Sprewell (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: KNICKS
Sprewell may be most famous for trying to choke out his coach, but he was also a tremendous basketball player. He was a three-time All-Star with Golden State before coming to the Knicks in the 1998-99 season, and scored 16.4 points with 4.2 rebounds, 2.5 assists, and 1.2 steals per game for the Knicks despite only starting in four of the 37 regular-season games he played for them. Yet, he was easily their best player in the postseason. In fact, he led all playoff scorers with 407 points that postseason. In the finals, he averaged 26 points, 6.6 rebounds, 2.6 assists, and 1.4 steals per game. He was also a solid defender, while Sean Elliott was more of a "glue guy." Elliot was 30 years old in this season and was a solid defender who could chip in across the board production for the Spurs. You can make an argument that his intangibles made him incredibly valuable to the Spurs, but Sprewell was one of the better players in the entire postseason, regardless of team.
2026: Devin Vassell (Spurs) vs Mikail Bridges (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: KNICKS
If you had asked anybody about this matchup three weeks ago, or in the early stages of the Hawks series when it seemed like Mikal Bridges was being pushed to the edges of the next rotation, the answer would have been entirely different. However, it’s impossible to ignore what Bridges has done in this 11-game winning streak. In that stretch, he has averaged 16.8 points, 3.8 rebounds, and 2.9 assists while being a historically efficient scorer. He became the first player in NBA playoff history to average 15 or more points on 60% shooting from the field, 40% shooting from beyond the arc, and 100% from the free-throw line. He’s been shooting 68.2% from the field overall and 45.8% from the three-point line, all while playing tremendous defense on the wing. He’s been playing with more aggression than we’ve ever seen him play with in a Knicks uniform before, and getting to the basket far more regularly. Vassell is a really strong player, and there’s a chance that, by the end of the series, he will be a more impactful player than Bridges, but that’s only if Bridges reverts to the player he was in the regular season. If we get any continuation of what we’ve seen from him over the last 11 games, he will be a major difference maker in this series.
Shooting Guard
1999: Mario Elie (Spurs) vs Allan Houston (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: KNICKS
Houston was a key part of the Knicks' scoring attack in this series — with Ewing out, everything fell to Sprewell and Houston on the wing. Houston dropped 34 in the Knicks Game 3 victory and averaged 21.6 points a game in the Finals. He did everything he could. Elie, along with Sean Elliott and Avery Johnson, gave Gregg Popovich solid veterans he could trust around the forces of nature that were Duncan and Robinson up front. Elie was solid all series and was third on the Spurs in scoring at 11.6 points a game, and he would pick up his third ring (he was a two-time champion with the Hakeem Olajuwon Rockets in 1994 and 1995).
2006: Stephon Castle (Spurs) vs Josh Hart (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
This will be one of the most telling matchups of the 2026 NBA Finals, even if these two are rarely matched up guarding one another. Hart's grit and defense matter to the Knicks style, but San Antonio is likely to try and "hide" Wemby on him, allowing their alien to patrol the paint — Hart has to knock down 3-pointers to pull him out to the arc. The Cavaliers tried the same thing with their bigs, and Hart hitting five 3-pointers in Game 2 with 26 points helped change the series.
Castle is going to be guarding Jalen Brunson a lot of the time, coming off doing as good a job as can be expected against Shai Gilgeous-Alexander last round. Castle's ability to drive and touch the paint, then score or find the open man, is going to matter in this series, too.
Point Guard
1999: Avery Johnson (Spurs) vs Charlie Ward (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
Younger readers might not know that Charlie Ward won the Heisman Trophy in 1993 as the quarterback for Florida State. Yet, despite that, he went undrafted in 1994 because he allegedly told teams he would only sign if he was a first-round pick. Instead, he wound up in the NBA and was a serviceable point guard for the Knicks. He started all 50 games for the Knicks that season and averaged 7.6 points, 5.4 assists, 3.4 rebounds, and 2.1 steals per game. He was arguably the Knicks' best defender in the Finals, but Avery Johnson was just a better player. The 33-year-old was also a solid defender and averaged 9.2 points, 7.6 assists, and 2.6 rebounds in the series. He had more assists than anybody else that postseason and was a tremendous floor general for this Spurs offense.
2026:De'Aaron Fox (Spurs) vs Jalen Brunson (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: KNICKS
This is a little bit like the center matchup, except with the advantage going to the Knicks. Fox is a strong player and has averaged 16.4 points, 4.0 rebounds, 5.9 assists, and 1.3 steals this postseason. He seems healed from his earlier ankle troubles and is a very capable passer and scorer. However, it’s impossible to say he wins in a matchup against Jalen Brunson. Brunson is averaging just under 27 points a game in the postseason with 6.6 assists and 2.8 rebounds per game while shooting 48.6% from the field. Of the players with at least 50 clutch field goal attempts in the postseason since 1997, Brunson has arguably been as good a scorer as Michael Jordan. He has the most points from the field per 36 minutes and has a higher effective field-goal percentage than Jordan in similar situations. He is the heartbeat of the Knicks and arguably the best player on the court in this series.
Bench
1999: Antonio Daniels, Steve Kerr, Jaren Jackson (Spurs) vs Chris Childs, Kurt Thomas, Chris Dudley (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
Some things never change, like the Spurs having elite depth. It was a much slower-paced game in 1999 — the pace for this series averaged out to 86.7 possessions per team per game — so coaches like Gregg Popovich could lean more heavily into their starters, who did not tire out as fast. Jackson led the Spurs reserves at 19.2 minutes and 6.6 points a game. Kerr would pick up his fourth ring as a player in this series, his first without Jordan on the team (Kerr would get another with the Spurs in 2003). Jeff VanGundy trusted his bench a little more; both Thomas and Childs averaged more than 20 minutes a night, and Thomas gave the Knicks 5.6 points and 7.6 rebounds a game. Still, this series was about the starters.
2025: Dylan Harper, Harrison Barnes, Keldon Johnson, Luke Kornet (Spurs) vs Mitchell Robinson, Deuce McBride, Landry Shamet, Jose Alvarado (Knicks)
ADVANTAGE: SPURS
The benches are going to matter a lot more in 2026 than they did in 1999. That starts with Knicks center Mitchel Robinson, who is expected to play just a week after surgery on his right hand (it wasn't exactly a pinkie finger injury) — New York needs his defense, his physicality, and his offensive rebounding (he had 10 offensive rebounds in the Knicks NBA Cup victory over the Spurs). Also, Shamet and the other Knicks shooters will need to remain red hot this series — he shot 11-of-12 from 3 against the Cavaliers.
Dylan Harper is a handful as a rookie (and Mitch Johnson isn't going to be able to keep him in a sixth man role much longer). He can get into the paint and finish at the rim, is very strong, can hit the three, and defend. Keldon Johnson is the emotional spark plug for this team and makes big plays. Part of what makes the Spurs so good is that there is not much of a bench drop-off, and the players' versatility lets Johnson mix and match with his starters depending on the matchups. If the Spurs bench outplays the Knicks' bench in this series, it is a huge step toward them winning it all
