AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTYou have a preview view of this article while we are checking your access. When we have confirmed access, the full article content will load.Knicks Fever? These New Yorkers Are Immune.Not everyone in the city is being swept up in the team’s championship drive. Some are just trying to see a Broadway show, or spin some yarn.Listen · 4:46 min It might not seem like it, given all the jerseys one sees on the street these days. But it is a provable fact that not every New Yorker is all in on the Knicks.Credit...DeSean McClinton-Holland for The New York TimesJune 8, 2026, 5:01 a.m. ETThere is something in the air in New York, and it’s orange and blue.The city is crackling with a particular electricity that results only from the combination of excellent temperatures, a low dew point and a winning home team. Anecdotal evidence suggests that people have been warmer to one another in exchanges on the subway. Practically everywhere you look, there are small tributes to this year’s team and the prospect — stronger by the day — of its being the first set of Knicks to go all the way since John V. Lindsay was mayor.But New Yorkers are not a monolith, and while some yell out “Let’s go Knicks!” at every given opportunity, others are impervious to the buzz.Wednesday night, as much of the city was glued to their TVs for Game 1 of the N.B.A. finals, Yvette Romero went to see “Ragtime” on Broadway. On her walk home, she came across young people making “happy noises,” she said.“I didn’t know what it was for, because I didn’t even know they were in the playoffs,” said Romero, a publishing industry retiree who was walking through Central Park on Thursday afternoon. “I don’t follow professional sports at all — nothing against basketball — so I did not know anything.”ImageFans were out in force on Friday, eager to watch their Knicks take on the San Antonio Spurs from afar at an official watch party in Manhattan.Credit...DeSean McClinton-Holland for The New York TimesRomero moved to New York in 1975 for “the culture, the museums and the theater, and things like that,” and has not been keeping tabs on the Knicks’ explosive sprint to the championship. Even when confronted with a crowd of euphoric Knicks fans, she came away confused.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT