For nearly a decade, NBA champions have had an unspoken agreement: You don’t go to the White House when Donald Trump is in it.
The Golden State Warriors and the Toronto Raptors skipped their visit after taking home the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy.
Last year’s Oklahoma City Thunder found a scheduling conflict convenient enough to avoid the conversation entirely.
Then the New York Knicks won the championship. And now everyone is wondering who will show up.
Days after the franchise ended a 53-year title drought, Knicks owner James Dolan went on WFAN to announce that the team had formally accepted an invitation to visit President Trump at the White House.
Fans are now learning that Dolan made the commitment without ever speaking to the players.
In one of his first interviews after the win, Finals MVP Jalen Brunson told New York Magazine that nothing was confirmed on his end.
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“We haven’t discussed it,” Brunson said. “But as a team, we’ll discuss it and we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”
Dolan had already burned the bridge down.
“We just did receive an invitation from the White House, which we accepted,” the owner said on WFAN. “We still have to figure out the details, et cetera, but yes, of course.”
He took credit for inviting his “friend” Trump to attend a game.
Game 3 of the NBA Finals on June 8 marked the night Trump became the first sitting president to attend an NBA Finals game, seated in Dolan’s luxury suite at Madison Square Garden.
The arena made its feelings known immediately when Trump’s face hit the Jumbotron, and the boos followed instantly.
The Knicks then lost 115-111, snapping a 13-game winning streak, before rallying to close out the San Antonio Spurs in five.
Many believe Trump brought his bad mojo to The Garden — messing up their dream of a clean sweep.
He singled out Brunson by name in a congratulatory post on Truth Social, calling the title “maybe the greatest in basketball history.”
Dolan has been a longtime financial supporter of the president and a friend for 30 years.
The Knicks roster hasn’t broken ranks publicly, but the signals are already there.
Jose Alvarado, pressed by TMZ Sports, gave the most noncommittal answer imaginable: “If there’s a chance, I’m going wherever my teammate goes.”
Mitchell Robinson, who greeted Trump’s Game 3 appearance with a shrug and a “cool, I guess,” doesn’t appear to be losing sleep over it.
Josh Hart — who has never been shy about his politics online — has gone conspicuously quiet. That silence is doing a lot of talking.
If the Knicks go, they won’t just be visiting the White House. They’ll be breaking a league-wide pattern that’s held for nearly a decade.
The last NBA champion to make the trek was the Boston Celtics — in 2024, under Joe Biden.
The fans aren’t waiting for an official decision, and are split in their opinion on this.
“You get invited to the White House, you go. Doesn’t matter who occupies it currently, or ever. Everything special in life is too fleeting to pass up precious experiences based on your own hard work,” one person tweeted.
Another expressed, “I don’t want to see them there! Hopefully they just come up with a bunch of excuses due to time constraints and then the next season starts!”
“From my POV, it’s not necessary to go! They should most definitely sit this one out,” someone else wrote.
One person wrote, “THEY WILL LOSE EVERY OUNCE OF RESPECT IF THEY GO FANS WILL GO CRAZY AND IT WILL SHOW HOW CORRUPT AND GLORIFIED CORUPTION IS AND TOLERATED BY THE RICH AND GREEDY WE WILL SEE.”
Someone else commented, “Dolan is the type of person that would threaten to trade Brunson’s Villanova teammates if they didn’t go. He would definitely hurt the team if he doesn’t get his way.”
The date isn’t set. The roster hasn’t voted. But in New York, the verdict is already coming in.
A fan declared, “I will love this team if they stand on business and say NO to Dolan and to Trump!”
