NEW YORK — The 2026 NBA Finals will feature a matchup decades in the making as the San Antonio Spurs and New York Knicks renew their rivalry on basketball’s biggest stage for the first time since 1999.
Game 1 tips off on Wednesday (Thursday in Manila) at the Frost Bank Center in San Antonio with the best-of-seven championship series airing live on ABC.
Regardless of who emerges victorious, the NBA will crown an eighth different champion in eight seasons — the longest streak of unique title winners in league history.
The Knicks enter the Finals riding an 11-game winning streak and are seeking their first NBA championship since 1973. New York has been one of the league’s hottest teams throughout the postseason, powered by Eastern Conference Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) Jalen Brunson and a veteran core that has finally delivered the franchise back to basketball’s grandest stage.
Meanwhile, the Spurs are looking to complete one of the NBA’s quickest turnarounds. After finishing 13th in the Western Conference and missing the playoffs for a sixth consecutive season last year, San Antonio now stands just four wins away from capturing its sixth championship.
Wembanyama, Brunson Headline Finals Showcase
The series also features two of the NBA’s brightest stars at vastly different stages of their careers.
San Antonio is led by Victor Wembanyama, the 7-foot-4 French sensation who continues his meteoric rise in just his third NBA season. Wembanyama enters the Finals as the unanimous NBA Defensive Player of the Year, a First Team All-NBA selection and the Western Conference Finals MVP.
On the opposite side is Brunson, whose journey from second-round draft pick to franchise cornerstone has become one of the league’s premier success stories. The Knicks guard earned Eastern Conference Finals MVP honors and now makes his first NBA Finals appearance.
The championship matchup also serves as a rematch of the 1999 NBA Finals, when Tim Duncan and the Spurs defeated the Knicks to secure the first title in franchise history.
The Spurs and Knicks represent two vastly different team-building philosophies.
San Antonio largely built its roster through the NBA Draft. Six of the 10 players expected to play significant minutes in the Finals were drafted by the Spurs organization, including Wembanyama, Stephon Castle and Julian Champagnie.
The Knicks took a different approach under team president Leon Rose, aggressively reshaping the roster through trades and free agency. Brunson, Karl-Anthony Towns, OG Anunoby, Josh Hart and Mikal Bridges were all acquired after beginning their careers elsewhere.
The contrasting strategies have produced the same result: a trip to the Finals.
"It took a long time for us to get here," Spurs forward Keldon Johnson said. "It took a village."
Adding another layer to the rivalry, New York defeated San Antonio in the 2025 Emirates NBA Cup championship game last December.
The Knicks now have an opportunity to become the first team to win both the NBA Cup and the NBA championship in the same season.
New York also boasts a unique championship connection through former Villanova teammates Brunson, Bridges and Hart, who could become the first trio to win both NCAA and NBA titles together.
But oddsmakers expect a highly competitive series.
The Knicks are priced at 13/8 to win the 2026 NBA championship at William Hill, one of the United Kingdom's leading sportsbooks, according to SempreInter.
The odds reflect the confidence surrounding New York's dominant postseason run, though San Antonio enters with home-court advantage and one of the league's most impactful players in Wembanyama.
Whether it is New York ending a 53-year championship drought or San Antonio completing a stunning rebuild, the 2026 NBA Finals promise a compelling showdown between two franchises that arrived at the same destination through very different journeys.