New York governor Kathy Hochul picked an unfortunate time to get her facts wrong about the Knicks.
After President Donald Trump announced plans to attend next month’s NBA Finals in New York, Hochul challenged the characterization of the Queens native as a ‘lifelong’ fan of the team.
‘I’d ask him to name the starting lineup of the 1993 championship team and see how he does,’ Hochul told a reporter when asked about Trump’s plans to visit Madison Square Garden.
Hochul, as any Knicks fan can attest, was mistaken. New York did not win a title in 1992-93, a season that actually ended with a six-game Eastern Conference Finals loss to the ultimate-champion Chicago Bulls. There is a chance she meant to say ‘1973,’ the Knicks’ last championship season, or 1994, when the team reached the Finals only to lose to the Houston Rockets, but that all remains unclear.
What is clear is that Hochul opened herself up for criticism as the Knicks are embarking on their first NBA Finals berth since 1999.
‘Anyone who knows my father knows he probably knows more about Sports than just about any human being not in the business,’ Trump’s eldest son and namesake wrote on X. ‘Kathy’s failed soundbite ain’t gonna land well… just like her policies.’
New York Governor Kathy Hochul did not have her facts straight when discussing the Knicks
Trump said he has been invited to attend one of the Finals games at MSG on June 8 or June 10
The New York Knicks celebrate after winning the Eastern Conference Finals on Tuesday
For the record, the Knicks’ starters for their 1973 Finals win over the Los Angeles Lakers included Dave DeBusschere, Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier, Earl ‘The Pearl’ Monroe, future US senator Bill Bradley and ‘The Captain’ Willis Reed.
Responses to Hochul’s faux pas fell along party lines, with conservative accounts blasting her as ‘stupid,’ while liberals lobbed insults at the newly married Trump Jr.
‘[Your dad] can go to a basketball game, but he couldn’t make your wedding,’ one critic wrote to Trump Jr.
Currently the Knicks don’t know whom they will face after sweeping the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Finals. The Oklahoma City Thunder took a 3-2 series lead over the San Antonio Spurs with the Western Conference Finals returning to central Texas on Thursday night for Game 6.
If San Antonio can win, Game 7 will be played Saturday in Oklahoma City before the NBA Finals begins on June 3. Regardless of who wins the West, Games 3 and 4 of the Finals will be played on June 8 and June 10 at Madison Square Garden.
As for Trump’s presence in New York, Hochul seemed unbothered.
‘If the President wants to come to a championship game in New York city, I suspect he’ll also be at World Cup events, he comes to the [UFC] fights, it doesn’t affect what I do,’ she said. ‘My job is to keep New Yorkers safe and celebrate the extraordinary teams we are blessed to have in the city of New York. I don’t see any problem with him coming.’
Trump will be arriving in the city as a major federal overhaul of Penn Station is being discussed. The cramped, overburdened train station sits below Madison Square Garden.
The Knicks will play either the San Antonio Spurs or Oklahoma City Thunder in the Finals
Hochul is hardly the first New York politician to take a loss on a mundane sports comment.
Hillary Clinton made news during her 2000 run for senate in New York because the Illinois native and admitted Chicago Cubs fan tried to claim some allegiance to the Yankees.
‘The fact is, I’ve always been a Yankees fan,’ Clinton told Katie Couric on NBC’s Today Show.
‘I am a Cubs fan,’ she quickly backtracked. ‘But I needed an American League team because when you’re from Chicago, you cannot root for both the Cubs and the [White] Sox. I mean, there’s a dividing line that you can’t cross there. So as a young girl, I became very interested and enamored of the Yankees.’
A subsequent Thomas Kuiper book was titled, ‘I’ve Always Been a Yankees Fan: Hillary Clinton in Her Own Words.’
Trump’s communications team has its own embarrassing history in this area as well.
Before honoring the 2018 World Series champions at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, the White House released a press release welcoming the ‘Boston Red Socks.’
The franchise was established in 1901 and has been using the nickname ‘Red Sox’ since 1908.
And the list goes on.
(Left) Then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton sings ‘Take Me Out to the Ballgame’ with Chicago Cubs television announcer Harry Caray. While running for senate in New York in 2000, Clinton tried to claim that she has ‘always been a Yankees fan’
Trump’s communications team has its own embarrassing history in this area as well. Before honoring the 2018 World Series champions at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, the White House released a press release welcoming the ‘Boston Red Socks’
Late Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy famously referred to ‘Sammy Soosa and Mike McGwire’ while discussing Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa and his Cardinals rival Mark McGwire
Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy famously referred to ‘Sammy Soosa and Mike McGwire’ in 1998 while discussing Chicago Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa and his St. Louis Cardinals rival Mark McGwire.
In 1996, while running for president against incumbent Bill Clinton, 73-year-old Bob Dole inadvertently showed his age by referring to the Brooklyn Dodgers – the National League franchise that moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1957.
Dole, who was criticized as being ‘too old’ during that campaign, saved face a few days later when referring to the Cardinals.
‘And I’d like to congratulate the St. Louis Cardinals on winning the N.L. Central,’ Dole told reporters. ‘Notice I said the St. Louis Cardinals, not the St. Louis Browns.’
The Browns moved to Baltimore in 1954 to become the Orioles.
