More New York Knicks Information

In 1949, the BAA merged with the National Basketball League to form the NBA as we know it today. The New York Knicks were in the league's Eastern Conference. In 1950, despite finishing only third in the East, the Knicks ran through the playoffs and met the Rochester Royals in the NBA Finals. The series went to a decisive game seven and the score was tied at 75 with just 40 seconds to play. This was in the pre-shot clock era, so Rochester held the ball and scored as time expired to win the title. Perhaps more important to the Knicks' run to the finals was the fact that the Knicks opened the door to one of the first blacks in the league, Nathaniel "Sweetwater" Clifton. Clifton, as well as several other black players in the league, helped pave the way for what is today one of the most racially diverse leagues in all of professional sports.

The New York Knicks hold an intense cross-coastal rivalry with the Los Angeles Lakers. The modern personification of the rivalry seems to be the incessant jawing of Spike Lee and Jack Nicholson, court-side fixtures at Knicks and Lakers games respectively. The rivalry, however, stems all the way back to the 1950s when the Lakers called Minneapolis home. The Knicks went to the finals three consecutive times in the 1950s, twice being defeated by the Lakers, thus the inception of one of the greatest rivalries in all of basketball.