The Knicks are one win away from their first NBA Finals appearance since 1999, up 3-0 over the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Finals after rallying from 22 down in the fourth quarter of Game 1 to win in overtime and rolling through Games 2 and 3 by double digits. They’re riding a 10-game playoff winning streak, the longest in franchise history. Madison Square Garden is loud again, the orange and blue is back in the cultural conversation, and Jalen Brunson is making a real case to climb this very list.

With Game 4 tipping off Monday night at 8 p.m. ET in Cleveland on ESPN and the Knicks looking to complete the sweep, the city is dreaming again. So before Brunson and company close it out and chase a banner, let’s honor the bloodline. Here are the 15 greatest Knicks of all time.

The forgotten star. Carl Braun played 12 of his 13 NBA seasons with the Knicks, was named an All-Star in five straight seasons from 1953 to 1957, and helped lead the franchise to its first three NBA Finals appearances. Per NBA.com’s all-time scoring leaders breakdown, he averaged double figures in nearly every season he played and even returned to coach the team after retirement. A Hall of Famer who built the bridge from the BAA era to the modern NBA. He earns the spot, even if just barely.

Before there was Kevin Durant, there was Bob McAdoo, a 6-foot-9 stretch big who could pull up from anywhere on the floor. Doo came to New York via trade in 1976 fresh off an MVP in Buffalo, and across his three seasons in orange and blue he led the team in scoring every year. As Yahoo Sports recently noted, McAdoo still holds the highest scoring average in franchise history at 26.7 points per game, edging Brunson’s 26.6. A Hall of Famer, three-time scoring champ, and an unmistakable influence on the modern stretch-five archetype.

Smooth as silk and money from midrange, Allan Houston spent nine seasons in New York averaging 18.5 points a game and gave the city one of its most unforgettable postseason moments: the runner over Alonzo Mourning that buried the top-seeded Heat in 1999. That eighth-seeded squad rode him all the way to the Finals, the only team to do that during the original 16-team playoff format. As NBA.com notes among the franchise’s scoring leaders, Houston’s shot stroke remains the gold standard for Knicks guards.

Don’t talk to a Knicks fan over 35 about toughness without saying Charles Oakley’s name. Oak spent a decade banging in the paint next to Patrick Ewing, supplied the muscle for every ’90s Finals run, and turned “no layups” into a citywide ethos. Per Bleacher Report’s deep franchise rankings, he ranks 13th on the team’s all-time rebounding leaderboard and was the enforcer those Pat Riley and Jeff Van Gundy teams could not have existed without.

A Bronx kid and ex-Marine, Richie Guerin was the toughest guard in the league during a rough stretch for the franchise. Across seven full seasons in New York he was a six-time All-Star, led the Knicks in scoring three times and assists for five straight years, and set franchise records of 57 points and 21 assists in a single game. As his Hall of Fame profile puts it, “the Knicks languished in those years, but Guerin was the toast of the town.” Inducted in 2013, and overdue at that.

Senator. Rhodes Scholar. Two-time NBA champion. Bill Bradley was the cerebral forward on both the 1970 and 1973 title teams, a Princeton grad who delayed his NBA debut to study in Italy and then came back to be exactly the kind of high-IQ, ball-moving role player those Red Holzman teams were built on. His No. 24 hangs in the rafters, and his Hall of Fame credentials are matched by a post-basketball career that included three terms in the U.S. Senate and a run for president. A real Knicks lifer.

Every championship team needs a connector, and Dave DeBusschere was that for both Knicks title teams in 1970 and 1973. According to Yahoo Sports’ franchise ranking, he averaged 16.0 points and 10.7 rebounds during his New York run and made all five of his NBA All-Defensive teams in orange and blue. He was the hard hat and lunchbox to Reed’s captaincy and Frazier’s flash, and a Hall of Famer in his own right.

Earl the Pearl. The Black Jesus. Earl Monroe was already a Hall of Fame guard with the Baltimore Bullets when he got to MSG in 1971, but his backcourt pairing with Walt Frazier on the 1973 championship team is one of the most stylish, most New York pairings the league has ever seen. Spinning, shimmying, head-faking grown men out of their sneakers, Pearl gave the Knicks a second title and a swagger that still influences how Black guards play and dress today. His No. 15 hangs in the rafters too.

Melo’s tenure was a complicated, often frustrating thing, but the bucket-getting was undeniable. Carmelo Anthony gave New York the 2012-13 division title (the franchise’s first since 1994), a scoring title in 2013 with 28.7 points a game, and a 62-point night at the Garden against the Bobcats that’s still the franchise record. He never got the supporting cast he deserved, but as Athlon Sports captured in its franchise legacy piece, the highlights, the mixtape of clutch jumpers, the cultural footprint, all of it landed Melo in the recently inducted Hall of Fame class.

“Fall back, baby.” Dick Barnett was the shooting guard who made the 1970 and 1973 title teams hum, a Tennessee A&I product (now Tennessee State, an HBCU) who’d already won three NAIA titles before he ever got to the league. Barnett pulled up from anywhere with a goofy-looking but lethal jumper, gave Red Holzman’s defense a bulldog on the wing, and became the first Knick to play in two NBA Finals as a starter. His No. 12 hangs at MSG, and he was finally inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2024 after decades of advocacy.

If only he never got hurt. Carmelo said it himself: “I wanted to be Bernard King.” Bernard King was a Brooklyn-born scoring machine whose four prime seasons at the Garden remain the stuff of pure Knicks folklore. As GiveMeSport documented in its all-time rankings, King won the 1984-85 scoring title at 32.9 points a game, finished second in MVP voting in 1984, and dropped 60 on Christmas Day against the Nets that same year. A devastating knee injury cut the era short. He was on a Hall of Fame, top-three-Knick trajectory before his body betrayed him, and that “what if” is one of the great tragedies in franchise history.

Captain Clutch. BrunsHIM. Jalen Brunson arrived in 2022 on a contract that was supposed to be an overpay and instead became the steal of the decade. He’s a three-time All-Star, an All-NBA selection, won 2024-25 Clutch Player of the Year, and led the Knicks to the NBA Cup title in December 2025. This postseason he’s averaging 29.0 points and 6.0 assists vs. Philly, and per Baron Davis, the 2026 version of Brunson is as unstoppable as prime Allen Iverson. If New York wins it all, he moves up at least one spot. He’s already the heir to a very specific Knicks lineage.

The Captain. Willis Reed gave New York one of the greatest single moments in American sports: limping out of the tunnel before Game 7 of the 1970 Finals, hitting the first two shots of the game, and willing the Knicks to their first championship. He was the 1969-70 MVP, a two-time Finals MVP, a seven-time All-Star, and the unquestioned soul of the only two title teams in franchise history. Per NBA.com’s historical files, his entire 10-year career was spent in orange and blue. His No. 19 hangs at MSG, and you can’t tell the story of New York basketball without him.

The most accomplished individual Knick of all time. Patrick Ewing was the No. 1 overall pick of the famously suspicious 1985 lottery (the “frozen envelope” conspiracy lives on) and gave New York 15 years of two-way dominance. The 11-time All-Star averaged 22.8 points, 10.4 rebounds, and 2.4 blocks per game in a Knicks uniform and remains the franchise’s all-time leader in nearly every counting stat that matters, including points, rebounds, blocks, and win shares, as Yahoo Sports outlined in its franchise rankings. He took the Knicks to the 1994 Finals, gave a generation of Black big men a blueprint, and did all of it during the Michael Jordan era. No ring isn’t his fault. No. 33 is the standard.

Mr. Cool. The blueprint. The greatest Knick of all time. Walt Frazier is the patron saint of New York point guards, a seven-time All-Star whose two-way brilliance powered both championship teams. His Game 7 line in the 1970 Finals (36 points, 19 assists, 7 rebounds) is still one of the most clutch performances in NBA history. Off the court, the furs, the Rolls, the rhyme schemes from the broadcast booth, he’s been the franchise’s style ambassador for over 50 years. As NBA.com’s Knicks scoring history documents, his No. 10 was the first Knicks jersey ever retired. Clyde isn’t just a Knick. Clyde is the Garden.

There’s no franchise quite like the Knicks. The lulls are brutal, the comebacks are mythic, and the Garden gets loud in a way that no other building in the league can match. With Brunson, Karl-Anthony Towns, Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby, and Josh Hart one win from the NBA Finals, a new generation is writing itself into this list. Don’t be surprised if the 2027 version of this ranking looks different. The Knicks go for the sweep in Game 4 vs. the Cavaliers on Monday at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN.