The Bounce Newsletter | This is The Athletic’s daily NBA newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Bounce directly in your inbox.The Knicks are one win away from their first NBA championship in 53 years. I saw fans lose their minds up and down Manhattan after the game. I saw Iman Shumpert in the tunnels of MSG, screaming in celebration and exultation that he didn’t need a security escort because he was walking out with J.R. Smith. I saw Patrick Ewing trying to figure out a ride home through the madness. And I saw Wu-Tang Clan smiling from ear to ear because of what they just witnessed. Last night was a one-of-a-kind experience.Cardiac KnicksDid that comeback really just happen?It starts with a joke at halftime. The Knicks are getting obliterated by the Spurs, and it looks like we’re headed toward an unprecedented fourth road victory in the first four games of the NBA Finals. But as San Antonio is raining down 3-pointers on the helpless Knicks, and a 27-point deficit at halftime is staring them in the face, everybody you talk to around you makes a funny little comment.“You know … if you can get this down to about 15 heading into the fourth quarter …”Everybody smirks. You start joking, “Imagine if that happened?” and you’re looking up the biggest comeback in finals history. Before last night, that answer was the 24-point comeback by the Boston Celtics in Game 4 of the 2008 finals against the Los Angeles Lakers. Now the answer is the Knicks’ 29-point comeback in Game 4 of the 2026 finals. Because New York did the impossible and turned those little jokes into reality.I still don’t fully understand what I just witnessed. The first half was an abomination for anybody not in the Spurs’ universe. We wanted a great game, and instead we had a mockery — San Antonio led 76-49 after two quarters. Then Wu-Tang Clan performed at halftime, and everything changed. Was it because of their medley of songs? Was it Taylor Swift deciding to endure the second half in her “Stevie Knicks” T-shirt? Was it the sage that fans lit outside Madison Square Garden between Games 3 and 4 finally cleansing the deep fibers of the world’s most famous arena?You may think all of this is ridiculous to ponder. It is! I’m still wrapping my head around being in the building for the biggest comeback in finals history. The Knicks cut the lead to 15 heading into the fourth quarter as the Spurs seemed to just stop taking this seriously. They pushed the lead back to 20 in the fourth, and it was supposed to be safe. It wasn’t. OG Anunoby and Jose Alvarado both had eight points in the final quarter. Jalen Brunson had nine. And the Spurs simply crumbled.We kept waiting for the Spurs’ youth to come into play during this playoff run. Their youth has hurt them in three of the four finals games – the worst time for it to rear its juvenile head. When Brunson missed the go-ahead 3-pointer with a couple of seconds left, the comeback looked like it would be thwarted by time and by default.