SAN ANTONIO – On April 9, 2015, Karl-Anthony Towns and six of his Kentucky men’s basketball teammates declared for the NBA Draft. When speaking with reporters that afternoon, Towns’ father expressed a dream of his son playing for the New York Knicks, not because it would keep him close to home, but so that Towns’ favorite team would be “good again.” Eleven years later, that dream has been fulfilled as the Knicks downed the San Antonio Spurs on Saturday by a 94-90 score in game five of the series.
Towns and the Knicks captured the series by a 4-1 mark on Saturday to claim the first title for the franchise since 1973. The Piscataway, New Jersey, native is the 19th player in Kentucky men’s basketball’s storied history to win an NBA Championship. Wildcats have won a combined 27 rings, and a player from UK has been on a title winning team in three of the last four seasons.
The Knicks went on a 13-game winning streak during the 2026 playoffs, the second-longest in playoff history. Additionally, New York captured nine straight on the road, bettering the 2001 Los Angeles Lakers for the longest road winning streak in a single postseason. The Knicks captured sweeps of Philadelphia and Cleveland in the Eastern Conference Finals to get to the team’s first NBA Finals appearance since 1999.
New York clawed back from double-digit deficits in all four victories over San Antonio in the NBA Finals. The Knicks are only the second team since 1997 to rally from double-digits to win four games in a playoff series – matching their own feat in which they achieved during the 2024 playoffs vs. the Philadelphia 76ers.
Towns averaged 15.9 points, 10.6 rebounds and 4.9 assists per game during the Knicks’ playoff run. He posted 13.0 points, 10.6 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 1.4 steals and 1.0 blocks per game in the finals, but it was his defensive effort on the Spurs’ star Victor Wembanyama that proved to be a difference maker for the champions.
He logged 94 assists during the playoff run, setting a center record for the Knicks during a playoff run. In the first 10 games of the playoffs, he matched the 66 total assists he had in 34 playoff games in the prior two years combined. In the opening round series against Atlanta, Towns had a pair of triple-doubles to become just the second 7-footer in NBA history to have multiple in a single postseason. Wilt Chamberlain is the only other player to achieve the feat. Furthermore, he became the first Knicks player to record a 20-point, 10-rebound double-double in an NBA Finals road game since Hall of Famer Dave DeBusschere in 1973. Towns posted 21 points and 13 rebounds in game two, a 105-104 win.
Towns averaged 20.1 points, 11.9 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game during the 2025-26 regular season. He led the NBA with 56 regular-season double-doubles, and the 11.9 rebounds per game ranked second in the league. He made his sixth-career NBA All-Star game appearance this season. It was the third consecutive season he was elected to the annual game.
The big man was a part of Kentucky’s historic 2014-15 squad which won its first 38 games en route to the Final Four. He was an All-American and the Southeastern Conference Freshman of the Year, averaging 13.9 points, 6.7 rebounds and 2.3 blocks per game. He became the third UK player to be taken No. 1 overall in the NBA draft when he was picked by the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2015.
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