Welcome to Steve Believes, the section where Steve Kaycee blogs about his predictions for certain sporting events, such as NFL games and March Madness games.
For the first time since early-February, Steve is back with a sports blog entry, with it being his prediction for the 2026 NBA Finals.
You can check it out below!
“Steve Believes: The 2026 NBA Finals”
I honestly haven’t watched a non-NBA Finals playoff round in its entirety since the 2023 Eastern Conference Finals between the Miami Heat and the Boston Celtics, and that’s fudging the truth a bit, as I didn’t see through the entireties of both Games 4 and 5 of that series. So, with that being said, the last non-NBA Finals round that I saw from beginning to end was the 1999 Eastern Conference Finals between the New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers, the former of whom won the Eastern Conference Championship exactly a week ago.
Yes, I love watching sports as much as the next avid sports fan, but the combination of being a versatile content creator and not wanting the aggravation of seeing certain teams (Oklahoma City Thunder) win all the time has caused me to not watch sports on a regular basis. But four days ago, I had time in between my evaluations of “Before I Fall” and “Mr. Right”, so I went to Hulu to catch what was left of Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals between those Thunder and the San Antonio Spurs. And as to which point that it was at that game, well it was about the 10-minute mark of the fourth quarter and the Spurs were up 87-82. Of course, I’m thinking that the lead will evaporate and the insufferable Thunder will return to the NBA Finals.
But fortunately, I was proven wrong, as the Spurs had an answer every time that the Thunder were threatening to make a run, whether it was timely three-point shooting or second chance paint points. Yes, this young and completely rebuilt Spurs team grew up right before our very eyes in both their first postseason appearance since 2019, and their first Conference Finals appearance since 2017 via the 111-103 Game 7 victory in a loud Paycom Center. And now they’re onto their first NBA Finals appearance since 2014 to take on the Knicks. It’s 1999 all over again.
Of course, that final NBA Finals series of the last millennium resulted in the Tim Duncan-led Spurs winning four games to one against a Knicks team that was at a size disadvantage without Patrick Ewing. But other than that slight front court advantage for that Spurs team, both teams were evenly matched, especially in Games 3 through 5 at Madison Square Garden.
Alright, so now the question is will the same matchup 27 years later result in the same outcome? Well, the Spurs have the best player on the planet in Victor Wembanyama and he’ll be a nightmare on both ends of the court for Jalen Brunson & Company, but the Knicks have made incremental progress in these last four postseasons, so I’m leaning towards that over a team that is a year ahead of schedule.
Yes, I’m taking the Knicks to win their first NBA title since 1973 and they’ll do so in six games, with Jalen Brunson winning series MVP.
Tune in on either June 14, June 17 or June 20 to find out if my prediction is correct or not.