The New York Knicks won the 2026 NBA Championship, but it didn’t come without it’s share of sacrifices from everyone involved. Reports after the Game 5 victory claimed that Knicks owner James Dolan suggested to players that they give up sex for 10 weeks as the team pursues a championship run.
Prior to the team’s NBA playoff run, Dolan spoke to the team at a practice and delivered a couple messages about what it would mean for this Knicks team to win a championship. No one knew about it until the report after the NBA Championship run.
The Roommates Show, a podcast hosted by Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart, recently took to social media and posted footage of the never-before-seen speech James Dolan gave his team. In fact, the entire 14-minute speech can be found on the podcast’s YouTube channel.
“I decided to come talk to you because I didn’t want to miss the opportunity,” James Dolan told his players. “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. 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.
“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, ever, ever 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 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 develop one thing that I said. When we win the championship, right, we will get rings. And when we get rings, so will games. I will buy a ring for each one of your significant others, because their contribution is going to be very important to this team winning. And if you don’t have a significant other, the closer you do, find someone that is sharing this ring with you for the next 10 weeks, and make that person come with you, and we’ll give that person a ring. 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, can you focus for 10 weeks, do 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 f***ing go away. Me too. Do it. Commit to it. Go for it. Let’s get it.”
Roommates EXCLUSIVE
NEVER BEFORE SEEN speech from Jim Dolan before the Knicks playoff run
pic.twitter.com/oZYBGinxYo
— Roommates Show (@Roommates__Show) June 15, 2026
James Dolan’s speech will go down in Knicks lore, as the franchise went on to win its first championship in 53 years by defeating the Spurs, 4-1.
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