Roommates EXCLUSIVE❗Jim Dolan's Motivational Speech Before The Knicks 2026 NBA Championship Run

You know, I'm nervous about this talk. You wouldn't think I would get nervous. I've stood up in front of 50,000 people and sang love songs with my guitar. And I'm more nervous now than I was then, because first off, I've never done this before. We bought partial ownership of this team in 1994. Took over full ownership of the team in '98. I took over control of the team in 2001. So I've been at this quite some time. And in all that time, I never did what I'm about to do with you guys. But I really felt, I mean, they debated whether to come talk to you, because owners really shouldn't talk to teams, players, because they don't know, and I don't purport to know a whole ton about basketball even though I've been doing it for 30 years. Not like you know for sure, but I decided to come talk to you because I didn't want to miss the opportunity. I believe that this team can go all the way. And in my 30 years of doing this, I've never felt closer to achieving that goal than right now. This team can win it all. And when I look back at this after this summer, I look back at this time, I wanted to say to myself that I didn't hold anything back. I didn't want to say, 'Oh, I wish I talked to them right back now this time.' So, I'm doing it. I'm going to tell you what I think. I'm going to tell you how I feel and I'm going to tell you what I'm going to be asking of you. I don't know if you understand what it would mean for you to win a championship this year, to win the NBA championship. It would be life-changing for all of you. It will stick with you the rest of your lives. And if you don't win, you'll be thinking about it the rest of your lives. And so will I, because I don't know if we're ever going to get this close again. We might. It's possible, right? But right now, this time, we're as close as I've ever seen a team be going into the playoffs. What that would mean to win a championship, to get a ring, to have your numbers up on the Raptors, right? You will forever be a part of New York City, no matter where you go and what you do the rest of your lives. When people introduce you, even if you become the president of the United States, right, they'll start off with 'NBA champion 2026.' I guarantee you that will be, even if you don't want it, you won't be able to avoid it. That's what's at stake here. And we have a rare and unique opportunity to do it. And it's not just you guys, the players, it's all of us. When I looked back at this season and this last year, there were some significant changes that we made. This is the team though, right now, you guys and all of you. This is the team that we wanted, that Leon and I wanted on the floor. Now, you know, we made trades, right, that we will be criticized or have been criticized about. We made a coaching change that shocked the world, right, last year. And that's all going to be part of this story for the rest of this season. If we win a championship, we'll be geniuses. If we don't win, we get knocked out in the first round or the second round, we will not be geniuses and we'll be second-guessed forever. So, just to tell you, and that's true across the board, that this is not just a player thing. This is a whole team, this whole organization thing. We all have been through this and we will be looking back on it 10 weeks from now, right? And we will have determined the outcome, right? Whether those trades, whether those coaching changes, etc., were smart or not smart. Personally, no matter what happens, I believe they were right. But that isn't necessarily how they'll be viewed. It's what we do in the next 10 weeks that will determine how that will be viewed. We changed coaches at the end of last season because we believed that Leon and I believed that you, the team, and the rest of the organization needed to be heard more, needed to work together more, not just led or dictated to. And Coach Thibs was a great coach, brilliant, etc. So, we thought that you needed a coach, right, that would pull you together, that would have you play as a team. And although it's not been perfect, we believe that together, a joint effort, right, would be better for the team. That would give us a shot, right, at winning a championship rather than relying on one person's opinion. And that's the team that we have now. You believe that instead of relying on the coach that you would discipline each other, that you would talk to each other, that you would figure out how to play together with each other, and that that was stronger than hearing it through just one voice. And now, why I'm here is because we have 10 weeks. 10 weeks in your life to achieve something that will stay with you the rest of your life and the rest of my life. But you're going to have to give it your all. You're going to have to give more now than you've ever given before to this team and to your careers. And the big word is sacrifice. You're going to have to sacrifice if you want to achieve this. You have to have a discussion with yourself about what these next 10 weeks are because it's only 10 weeks. It's not a long time. But if you can now focus yourselves, sacrifice everything around you for these next 10 weeks to win that championship, I believe you can do it. I've seen you do it this season and you've seen yourselves do it. You know you can do it. I believe you know you can do it. But will you do it? You need sacrifice and you need to eliminate all the distractions around you. I'm going to tell you now. Stop talking to the press. Instead, talk to each other. Press doesn't mean that. You want to communicate to your teammates, you want to communicate to the staff, etc., do it. Just forget the press. Doesn't matter what the public thinks of you. I could tell you I've been doing this for 30 years, right? At the end of this 10 weeks, what you achieve is what the public is going to think of you, not what you say, right, in the press conferences or etc. It's what the outcome will be in 10 weeks. That's when what you say will have real meaning. In the meanwhile, talk to each other. Give your concerns, your gripes, etc. Do it with each other. Make a commitment to that. I got some other suggestions for you. You need to start, you need to up your practice. You need to pay more attention to your diet. You need to sleep better. You need to be ready for every game. And just let me start on that point. That is not something you start on the first game of the playoffs. That is something you start right now today. You have to practice this right for the next game and the next four games so that you've got a rhythm to yourselves when you get into the playoffs. I suggest that you go home and you talk to your families, you talk to your girlfriends, your wives, etc. And you tell them about the next 10 weeks, about how you're going to be different the next 10 weeks and how your families are going to sacrifice for the next 10 weeks. I had this idea that maybe you should give up sex for the next 10 weeks. You don't have to give up sex for the next 10 weeks. But, like Spartans, you know what Spartans are, right? They denied themselves, right? So that they could have an edge. Get the edge. Go home. Talk to your wives. Tell them, don't tell them you're not going to have sex. Don't tell them it was my idea, but let them know what this is going to be like, what your commitment is going to be like, and how they're going to have to sacrifice, too. Those concerns at home, they can't come on the court. They can't come into the practice. For the next 10 weeks, this has just got to be all about us and about how we play. It's not who we play, it's how we play. Because I believe this team can beat anybody in the NBA. We've already shown that we can. So, it's not who we play, it's how we play. So, when you go home and you talk to your brides and your significant others, I do want you to tell them one thing that I said. When we win the championship, right, we will get rings. And when we get rings, so will they. I will buy a ring for each one of your significant others because their contribution is going to be very important to this team win. And you know, if you don't have a significant other, most of you do, find someone that is sharing this journey with you for the next 10 weeks and make that person come with you guys, right, and we'll give that person a ring. We talked about the coach. We talked about Thibs and how we did it last year. All right. How Thibs led us last year. But now this whole season it's been we've tried to have more of a team effort, more of a collective effort, etc. But now I need you to switch gears slightly because your coach has the answers to what we need to do in order to win. So you have to take his guidance. You got to almost blindly take his guidance and dedicate yourselves to correcting the things that he has pointed out to you like first quarter focus. All right, defensive pick and rolls and rebound. I know there are others, but only three. Fix those three the next 10 days. Fix those three things as part of your focus. Do whatever you have to do personally, do whatever you have to do interpersonally, etc. But fix those three things because those are our Achilles heels, right? And they'll stop us in the playoffs. You got to try like you've never tried before. It's only 10 weeks, guys. You got to go for it every day for the next 10 weeks. You got to go for it. You got to say, I know I don't normally do that. Whatever it is, right? You got to say no. Right? You got to leave nothing on the table. You must go for it. That's basically it. I believe in you guys. I believe in this whole group. This is not just a player thing. This is an entire organization thing. We've been working at this for years to get ourselves to this point and now 10 weeks. Can you do it? Can you focus for 10 weeks? If you do that, at the end of 10 weeks, we're walking out of here with rings, right? And we're walking out of here with a moniker on ourselves that will never ever go away. Me, too. Do it. Commit to it. Go for it. Let's go.