UPDATE: It’s amazing how a little public pressure and embarrassment can make even a billionaire change his tune. The New York Knicks plan to give 275 team employees championship rings — and say that was always the plan. The New York Post’s Stefan Bondy had the story, with this quote:
“The company is gifting more than 275 championship rings and jewelry to players, coaches, employees and other members of the Knicks family, worth more than $3.7 million, in recognition of their contributions and celebrating this achievement,” an MSG spokesman told The Post.
The Spokesman added this about the phishing email, admitting that was poor judgment.
“The company had previously sent out an email to its corporate team as a simulation of a phishing attack designed to strengthen our security against hackers,” an MSG spokesman told The Post. “MSG was recently hacked and extorted using an employee login and password obtained through a similar phishing attack. Using the rings as a lure to gain employees attention was an unfortunate mistake.”
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The vibes inside Madison Square Garden were immaculate on ring night, with the first banner in 53 years going up to the rafters, the sudden appearance of an NBA Cup 2025 championship banner, Jalen Brunson getting his deserved love, OG Anunoby getting the second-loudest ovation (historic tip-ins will do that), and the crowd barking at coach Mike Brown (who has an odd love for the song “Who Let the Dogs Out”). Even a loss to the 76ers didn’t spoil the mood much.
But owner James Dolan is trying to. Dolan still hasn’t sprung for the rings for the Knicks assistant coaches, who received empty ring boxes during the ceremony and didn’t open them, a story broken by Joe Varden at The Athletic. It’s also unclear whether head coach Mike Brown got his ring.
Seven league sources, all speaking on condition of anonymity so they could talk freely about a sensitive matter, said the Knicks assistant coaches did not get rings on banner night. Two of those sources told The Athletic that the assistants learned earlier Tuesday that they would not be getting their rings that evening, which came as no surprise because they had not yet been fitted for one and that boxes without their rings were a late addition to the ceremony.
Those coaches are at various levels of pissed off — and they have every right to be. It’s also worth noting that assistant coaches don’t always get their rings on ring night — the Thunder assistants didn’t last year. However, for most teams, they get their rings that night, but at least they’ll get them. Someday.
Tradition with championship teams is that a number of the teams’ staff also get rings — faces you know, like the broadcast team, but also the people who do the hard work on the business side of the operation as well. Usually, deeper in the team staff, those rings don’t have all 80+ diamonds and all the baubles, but they get real, meaningful rings.
Not in New York. With the Knicks, those people not only didn’t get rings — they got a phishing scam about the rings.
Those Madison Square Garden employees got their hopes up at the end of September when the Knicks sent an email to a long list of employees, which gave recipients a first glimpse at their would-be championship rings. Atop the email, a copy of which The Athletic has obtained, was a graphic of two differently styled rings...
But the email was a fake-out, a phishing test Madison Square Garden sent to see if those employees would click, multiple team sources said.
Clicking the link in the phishing scam meant those employees got to go to a cybersecurity class. Congratulations!
Viewers of the ring night ceremony on NBC and Peacock may also have noticed that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, who usually addresses the crowd and shakes players’ hands as they get their rings, did neither. That’s just the latest installment of the long-running feud between Dolan and Silver.
Ring night in New York was still special, but only Dolan could find a way to take a little shine off the event to save a few bucks.
