Start spreading the news … New York sports are back!
The New York Liberty are champions. The New York Yankees are in the World Series. The New York Mets played deep into October. The New York Rangers are Stanley Cup contenders. The New York Knicks just tipped off their most highly-anticipated season in decades. The New York Jets have Aaron Rodgers at quarterback and … well, forget about that one for now.
Three out of the four main sports ain’t bad!
The area’s 15-year championship drought — an eternity in the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately city that never sleeps — ended Sunday when the Liberty captured their first title in franchise history.
That same night, the city was just two victories away from hosting a rare Subway Series until the Mets’ surprising run to the NLCS came to an end when they were eliminated by the Los Angeles Dodgers.
The Yankees will now play the Dodgers in the World Series as they look to capture their first championship since 2009, which is New York’s last title in the main men’s professional sports leagues.
So, even with the Jets’ and Giants’ disappointing seasons, it’s been a memorable calendar year in New York. Ticker tape will once again float through the skies of downtown Manhattan during a championship parade down the Canyon of Heroes.
Here’s a look at some of New York’s best years in sports history.
The Liberty’s WNBA title win was the first basketball championship in NYC in decades — and now the party plans are underway, with a parade set for Thursday through the Canyon of Heroes in lower Manhattan, followed by a City Hall ceremony. NBC New York’s Jessica Cunnington reports.
1927
Aaron Judge, Juan Soto and Giancarlo Stanton might be the 2024 postseason version of Murderers’ Row. But nearly 100 years before they led the Yankees to the World Series, the team’s original Murderers’ Row featuring Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig regularly did the same.
The 1927 Yankees are remembered as one of the greatest baseball teams of all time, going 110-44 in the regular season and sweeping the Pittsburgh Pirates in the World Series.
That same year, the Giants recorded eight shutouts while going 11-1-1 to capture their first NFL championship.
The Rangers, in the NHL’s second season, were 8-6-4 when the calendar flipped to 1928, a year in which they’d win their first Stanley Cup.
1951
It wasn’t just the shot heard around New York. It was the “Shot Heard ‘Round the World.”
That was the iconic moniker given to Bobby Thomson’s walk-off home run that lifted the New York Giants to a 5-4 win over the Brooklyn Dodgers at the Polo Grounds. The Giants trailed by two runs in the ninth inning when Thompson’s three-run homer led to one of the most iconic calls in baseball history: “The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!”
The Giants, however, did not win the World Series. They went on to lose in six games to another New York team: the Yankees.
The football Giants also had a strong season, finishing 9-2-1. The year also saw the Knicks start a season in which they would advance to Game 7 of the 1952 NBA Finals, which they lost to the Minneapolis Lakers.
1956
Two titles in the same stadium in the same calendar year? Doesn’t happen very often, but it did in 1956. The Yankees won the World Series, defeating the crosstown rival Brooklyn Dodgers in seven games.
The Giants, in their first season playing home games at Yankee Stadium, defeated the Chicago Bears 47-7 in the NFL Championship.
1969
Joe Namath’s Super Bowl guarantee. The Miracle Mets. The start of the Knicks’ first championship run. It all happened in the same year.
Namath and the Jets upset the Baltimore Colts 16-7 in Super Bowl III to capture the team’s lone championship.
The Mets, after losing 100-plus games in five of their first seven seasons, stunned the baseball world by winning 100 games in the regular season and upsetting the Baltimore Orioles in the World Series in five games.
The Knicks, who had gone without a title in their first 23 seasons, tied a then-NBA record by winning 17 games in a row. They would sit atop the standings at 33-7 on New Year’s Eve in 1969. That season would later end in 1970 with the team’s first championship banner being raised to the Madison Square Garden rafters.
1986
It’s a sports year that is well known thanks to the “’86 Mets.”
The beloved team’s wild off-the-field exploits are as well known as Mookie Wilson’s little roller up along first that went through the legs of Bill Buckner. The latter, of course, capped the Mets’ thrilling 10th-inning comeback in Game 6 of the World Series against the Boston Red Sox. That forced Game 7, which the Mets won 8-5.
Earlier that year, the Giants won their first Super Bowl, capping a 14-2 season with a 39-20 victory over the Denver Broncos for the team’s first title in 30 years.
That January was also the closest New York has come to a Giants-Jets matchup in the Super Bowl. The Jets, after going 10-6, defeated the Kansas City Chiefs in a wild card game. They advanced to play the Cleveland Browns in the divisional round, where they surrendered a 10-point fourth quarter lead and lost on a field goal in overtime.
1994
A year in which New York nearly won a pair of championships in the same week.
Madison Square Garden simultaneously hosted the Stanley Cup Final and NBA Finals in June of 1994, creating one of the most memorable stretches in the city’s sports history as both series went to a deciding Game 7.
The Rangers defeated the Vancouver Canucks at the Garden to win their first Stanley Cup since 1940. The next night, in the same building, the Knicks beat the Houston Rockets to even the NBA Finals at 2-2. The Knicks then won Game 5 to move within one victory of their first championship since 1973 before losing two straight games in Houston.
The same night the Knicks lost Game 7 — June 22 — the Yankees improved to 42-27 with a victory over the Minnesota Twins. They remained atop the American League through Aug. 11, when they had a 70-43 record and the team played its last game due to a player strike that would end the season.
2000
Get your tokens ready! Yes, kids, before iPhone apps and MetroCards, you had to use tokens to ride the subway.
And plenty of tokens were needed in New York that October as the Yankees and Mets played in the World Series for the first and only time. The Yankees went on defeat the Mets in five games to win their third consecutive championship and fourth in five years.
The Knicks, coming off an appearance in the 1999 NBA Finals, reached the Eastern Conference finals. The Giants finished the season 12-4 and would advance to the Super Bowl in January 2001.
So, it was a strong start to the new millennium for New York sports.
Chopper 4 was over Yankee Stadium on Monday afternoon as the team practiced on the field ahead of the World Series with the Dodgers. World Series signage could be seen over the dugouts.
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