Fifty-three years is a long time to wait for anything, let alone a championship.
New Yorkers finally got their moment last month when the Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs in five games to claim the franchise’s first title since 1973, with Jalen Brunson dropping 45 points in the clincher to seal it and take home Finals MVP.
Now that hardware is headed somewhere nobody saw coming: right next to dinosaur bones and gemstones on the Upper West Side.
11 August 2026 10:00 + more dates
The trophy is getting a very fitting new home
Starting Monday, July 27, the NBA’s Larry O’Brien Trophy, freshly engraved with the Knicks’ name as 2025-26 champions, will go on display at the American Museum of Natural History through January 3, 2027, joining the museum’s For the Win: Objects of Sports Excellence exhibition.
The trophy itself is a serious piece of craftsmanship, standing as a regulation-size basketball dropping into a net, sterling silver with gold vermeil, made by Tiffany & Co. and weighing in at roughly 30 pounds.
It’s named for former NBA Commissioner Larry O’Brien, who ran the league from 1975 to 1984, and every winning team since 1947 has its name etched somewhere on it.
Museum president Sean M. Decatur put it simply: this championship gave New Yorkers a rare shared moment to celebrate, right as global and hometown sports energy has been colliding all over the city.
Why this feels like more than just a trophy on a shelf
For the Win already had a Knicks connection built in before the team even won anything this year.
The exhibit, which opened in May inside the Melissa and Keith Meister Gallery within the Allison and Roberto Mignone Halls of Gems and Minerals, features a basketball-shaped fob presented to legendary Knicks coach Red Holzman after the 1973 title, the franchise’s last championship before this one.
Guest curator Vikki Tobak called it a “full circle moment” nobody could have planned: the exhibit opened with a relic from the Knicks’ last title, and now it’s closing that gap with the trophy from their newest one.
It’s an awesome spectacle to see in whole — especially for the Knicks’ older generation of fans who may have witnessed both.
What else is worth seeing while you’re there
The trophy isn’t the only thing to check out with the exhibit, either.
For the Win packs in more than 70 objects across 15-plus sports and nearly 150 years of athletic history, and the lineup reads like a greatest-hits list of things you’ve actually heard of:
- One of Jesse Owens’s gold medals from the 1936 Berlin Olympics
- The NFL’s Vince Lombardi Trophy
- The New York Liberty’s 2024 WNBA Championship trophy
- Championship rings and medals spanning baseball, soccer, tennis, boxing, and more
The exhibition is included with general admission, so there’s no extra ticket needed to go see the trophy up close, which honestly makes this one of the easier “must-see” moments for sports fans in the city.
🏀 You can snag tickets tickets to the American Museum of Natural History, starting at $37 for Monday here!