The scenes in New York on Wednesday, after Game 4, offered a hint of what was to come: entire city blocks flooded with orange and blue; fans riding vehicles like parade floats; horns blaring; confetti flying; perfect strangers transformed, if only for an evening, into the very dearest friends.
When, on Saturday night, the New York Knicks won their first NBA championship since 1973, defeating the Spurs, 94–90, in San Antonio, the city erupted into a joyous bedlam of epic proportions.
In an era otherwise defined by a strain of social alienation variously empowered by technology and by politics, New York has bucked all that rather violently, communing over the generational greatness of its home team—and especially Karl-Anthony Towns, Josh Hart, OG Anunoby, and Jalen Brunson—after so many years of what sports columnist Mike Vorkunov frankly described in The Athletic as “horrible, soul-crushing pain.”
On Saturday night, photographer Poupay Jutharat took to the streets of Manhattan’s West Village—site of some of the most jaw-dropping crowds anywhere in the city—to witness firsthand what happened when the Knicks won the title in five.
Photographed by Poupay Jutharat
Photographed by Poupay Jutharat
Photographed by Poupay Jutharat
