The New York Knicks’ trio of Villanova Wildcats was up to scratch and then some in their run to the 2026 NBA title.
As part of the Sermon on the Mount on the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus Christ told his followers to “love your enemies.” The New York Knicks know exactly what he meant, as many no doubt hold a special appreciation for a certain section of the Philadelphia area.
Many New Yorkers likely view Philly through the same lens through which Obi-Wan Kenobi saw Mos Eisley Spaceport. Salvation, however, lay within: the newly-crowned champions have routinely relied upon the efforts of former Main Line dwellers Mikal Bridges, Jalen Brunson, and Josh Hart, whose divine intervention has placed the Knicks back at the top after their 4-1 series victory over the San Antonio Spurs in the 2026 NBA Finals.
With the Knicks’ win, the hands of Bridges, Brunson, and Hart are set to get a little heavier, as their NBA rings are set to join the bands they previously earned at Villanova. All three Jay Wright protégés repped the Wildcats in their 2016 run to the NCAA men’s national championship while Bridges and Brunson were around for the victorious return trip two years later.
“Being able to win with Mikal and Josh, it’s a great feeling,” Brunson said upon hoisting both the Larry O’Brien Trophy and the Bill Russell title bestowed to the series MVP. “It’s truly a great feeling knowing that I got to meet them at a young age and we were able to grow as friends, as teammates in college, and be able to achieve something in college, and then to be able to do this at this level is just as special, maybe a little more special.”
Remember the Alamo(dome)
Everything’s bigger in Texas … including the nostalgia.
History suggested it’d be foolish to bet against Bridges, Brunson, and Hart with a championship on the line in San Antonio: less than 10 minutes away from the Spurs’ home of Frost Bank Center, the site of Saturday’s clinch, sits the Alamodome, the site of the 2016 triumph against North Carolina.
In hindsight, the win over UNC, brought about by a buzzer-beating triple from Kris Jenkins, was just the start of redemption through the Augustinians: the Alamodome is also where a Knicks group that featured Brunson’s father and current assistant coach Rick Brunson lost the first two games of the 1999 NBA Finals to the same Spurs.
It was going to take a lot to remove that win from the perch of Hart’s nostalgia files. Game 5 of the series against the Spurs proved the impossible in more ways than one.
“We have a bond for life. We obviously won the [national] championship, but this one takes the cake. But those are my brothers,” Hart said after the win. “I wouldn’t want to go into a game with anyone else besides them at my back. I love those guys, and we are going to be friends and brothers for a lifetime.”
2016 Stephen A Smith: “Villanova doesn’t have a real NBA prospect on this squad”
Skip Bayless: “No, they don’t, mm-mm”
2016 Wildcats = 7 NBA players:
—Jalen Brunson
—Mikal Bridges
—Josh Hart
—Donte DiVincenzo
—Eric Paschall
—Ryan Arcidiacono
—Daniel Ochefu pic.twitter.com/5eMtb9Ttzd— New York Basketball (@NBA_NewYork) August 31, 2023
Up to Scratch
In a niche few were asking for, but many are enjoying, Bridges, Brunson, and Hart have essentially made a business of solidifying the reputations of historic programs lacking the all-important metric of championship panache.
Brunson obviously wasn’t the first Villanova alum to play for the Knicks. Heck, he wasn’t even the first one from the 2016 club to don the jersey: that honor instead belongs to Ryan Arcidiacono, the last ‘Cat to touch the ball before Jenkins’ famous fling.
While holding a respectable reputation thanks to its famed 1985 upset of Patrick Ewing and Georgetown and enhanced by Wright’s two-decade-plus run at the helm, Villanova basketball was not exactly known as an NBA factory. Its ‘Cats were spread through the league and found sporadic success: Paul Arizin is in the Hall of Fame, while Kyle Lowry continues to linger on the modern Association ledgers.
Still, situating the all-time Villanova team against the likes of, say, Duke’s, Kentucky’s, or even North Carolina’s would feel cruel to the Philadelphia faithful. Stephen A. Smith bluntly granted this perception a national platform hours before the famous tilt with the Tar Heels, chiding the ‘Cats for not carrying “a real NBA prospect” on their roster. Since then, seven players from the famed 2016 squad have taken the floor in the NBA, including five for the Knicks, with Arcidiacono and Donte DiVincenzo joining the championship trio in Manhattan melodies.
Divine intervention has come for the campus in more ways than one: men’s basketball isn’t the only realm where the Wildcats hold a domain, as the Larry O’Brien Trophy hoist comes just over a year after the election of another Villanova alum, Cardinal Robert Prevost … now known as Pope Leo XIV … to the top of the Roman Catholic Church.
Congratulations to the Nova Knicks—Jalen Brunson ’18 CLAS, Mikal Bridges ’18 CLAS and Josh Hart ’17 CLAS—for helping lead the New York Knicks to the 2026 NBA Championship. It was the Knicks’ first NBA title in 53 years.
Learn more: https://t.co/3P44QzS1TZ pic.twitter.com/LORe1MnTiN
— Villanova University (@VillanovaU) June 14, 2026
Doubting Thomases Drop
But leave it to the alumni of a private Catholic school to quell an army of doubting Thomases. Despite their collegiate success, those at the NBA level still didn’t have faith beyond the championship prowess.
Hart made his NBA entry first, joining the Los Angeles Lakers as the final pick of the 2017 draft. He would have to keep change-of-address forms handy as he went from SoCal to New Orleans to Portland, serving as a sweetener in deals headlined by Anthony Davis and CJ McCollum.
Brunson was a second-round pick in 2018. His selection by the Dallas Mavericks was mostly buried under the arrival of international sensation Luka Dončić. Bridges heard his name called much earlier that night, as the Philadelphia 76ers appropriately took him 10th overall. The locals immediately shipped him off to Phoenix, who shipped him to Brooklyn years later for the right to work with an aging Kevin Durant.
When the Knicks reunited the trio … briefly back with DiVincenzo before he was shipped to Minnesota in the Karl-Anthony Towns deal … such negativity continued to prevail. Many wondered what sort of analytic the power of friendship could be. Kendrick Perkins, a rare consistent endorser of metropolitan hardwood affairs, took Brunson and Hart to task for staging their “Roommates Show” podcast during the season, imploring them to take the ultimately Paul George route that saw him shut down “Podcast P” in anticipation of a playoff run that never came.
Jalen Brunson Silences Critics
No one’s talking now that the Knicks have prevailed … not even Brunson, who isn’t “respond[ing] to [the critics] then” and is “damn sure not going to respond to them now.” That’s not stopping those off the Main Line from professing the newfound faith, even if Christ Himself would offer similar admonishment He granted to Thomas, who needed to see to believe.
“He’s comfortable there,” NBC Sports commentator and ex-Knick Jamal Crawford said of Brunson’s success to Ramona Shelburne of ESPN. “They empowered him. They believed in him. He’s got guys on the team from Villanova that he knows and who fit his play style. He’s got his dad on the bench, who knows exactly what buttons to push to get him going. He knows Leon. So with that comfortability, I think you’re going to get the best of him.”
“The longer you can keep a group together, I think that’s better,” added head coach Mike Brown, noting that the Wildcat litter headlines the sense of familiarity that has thrust his team forward (h/t Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic). “It’s kind of always been that to a certain degree. You know, way, way back, the Lakers, they had Karl Malone, I think Gary Payton, and a couple other superstars that they threw together one year, and it was hard. Not to say that it can’t be done. I’m sure it’s been done. But the longer the group can stay together, I feel the better chance they have.”
Geoff Magliocchetti is on X @GeoffJMags
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