Mike Breen, longtime voice of Knicks and NBA Finals, now set to call both at once
· Yahoo Sports
NEW YORK — Mike Breen’s recent interactions with Knicks fans have gone a little differently than they did during the decades prior.
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Breen — a voice of the Knicks since 1991, including for MSG Networks since 1998 — has had a front-row seat for so many of the franchise’s highs and lows, including the 27-year NBA Finals drought that will officially end when Game 1 in San Antonio tips off on Wednesday night.
“I can’t tell you how many fans over the past couple of weeks, when you see them on the street or anywhere, they say, ‘Oh, I’ve waited my whole life for this,’ ” Breen, 65, told the New York Daily News.
“Now, some of them might be 17 years old and haven’t been around for that long, but there are a lot of people, even my age, who don’t really remember the championship years. For them to experience this is special.”
Breen does remember the championship years.
A native of Yonkers, Breen was two weeks away from his ninth birthday when the Knicks won their first title in 1970. He watched again as the Knicks won their second — and still most recent — championship three years later.
“My two favorite players for the Knicks were [Walt] ‘Clyde’ [Frazier] and Dave DeBusschere,” Breen said. “For me, I thought they were the greatest players on Earth. So, that started my love of basketball.”
All of that history makes this year’s Finals unique for the Hall of Famer Breen, who, in addition to his longtime local coverage of the Knicks, has been ESPN and ABC’s lead NBA play-by-play announcer since 2006.
This is set to be the 21st year in a row that Breen calls the NBA Finals on ABC — extending his record for the most Finals broadcasts — but the first time the Knicks have made it there during that stretch.
It will be the first time Breen announces Knicks games in an NBA Finals in any capacity since 1994, when he was the play-by-play man for New York’s WFAN radio.
“In terms of the pregame electricity, there’s no place like Madison Square Garden,” Breen said.
“There’s so many great atmospheres around the league, but even the pregame electricity is very noticeable there. The Game 1 against the Cavs in the [Eastern] Conference finals, that fourth-quarter comeback, that’s as loud as I’ve heard the building in a long, long time.”
On the local broadcasts, Breen calls Knicks games with Frazier. He’s set to call the Finals alongside analysts Tim Legler and Richard Jefferson, marking the first time that booth has done a Finals together.
Knicks and Spurs fans can expect a neutral broadcast as Breen and ABC aim to appeal to a national audience.
“I learned from the best in Marv Albert that you have a job to do,” said Breen, referring to the announcer who preceded him both at MSG Networks and as a Finals play-by-play voice.
“Quite frankly, every year we do the Finals, the fans of each team think that we’re rooting for the other team, whether it’s the Knicks or whether it’s the Celtics or whether it’s the Lakers. That’s just the way they are, and quite honestly, that’s a beautiful thing because it shows how passionate [they are].”
The Knicks enter the NBA Finals on an 11-game winning streak, during which they have outscored their opponents by 262 points. That’s the biggest point differential over an 11-game span — regular season or playoffs — in NBA history.
Breen said he began to observe during last season that the Knicks had the potential to defeat anyone, as evidenced by their second-round upset of the defending-champion Boston Celtics.
Now, buoyed by continuity, a roster led by Jalen Brunson, Karl-Anthony Towns, Josh Hart, OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges has the Knicks four wins away from their first championship since 1973.
“They had stretches of uneven play, stretches where you see they were still a work in progress,” Breen said. “That, to me, is [what is] most impressive — even in the ups and downs, the ebb and flow of a regular season, they stuck together, they kept working, and it just all clicked in the playoffs to the point where this is one of the great playoff runs in NBA history.”