'Kid, stay with it': Lifelong Knicks fans keep believing

Longtime New York Knicks fans who remember the team's 1973 championship season are daring to believe again, as the franchise returns to the NBA Finals in 2026. For Lavert Henderson-Hobbs, 78, the Knicks are more than a team. They are a lifetime commitment. At her home in Rockville Centre, New York, Henderson-Hobbs held up pieces of Madison Square Garden floor from the Knicks' 1973 championship season, signed by Walt "Clyde" Frazier and Earl "the Pearl" Monroe. She was there for the 1973 title, for the Knicks' Finals runs in 1994 and 1999, and plans to be there again in 2026. Henderson-Hobbs said she has attended more than 2,000 Knicks games and has only missed one game because of illness. Her love for the team is also tied to her late husband, Ernest Victor Eugene Hobbs, who first asked her to a Knicks game in 1970. After he died in 2014, she continued going to games, taking family and friends with her. "I'm still with the game," she said. "I've been there for 56 years, and I plan to continue as long as my poor little legs will allow me to go." On Manhattan's Upper West Side, 87-year-old Frances Bernstein organized the first tailgating party at The Apsley, the assisted living community where she lives. Bernstein was paralyzed when she first came to The Apsley after it opened in 2023. After suffering a stroke, she progressed from being bedridden to undergoing therapy, then using a wheelchair, then a walker and now a cane, which she eventually hopes to stop using. Now known as the unofficial mayor of The Apsley, Bernstein wore a Patrick Ewing No. 33 jersey as she greeted residents at the Knicks-themed party. Asked what she would do if New York won, Bernstein said: "Oh my God, I think with my walker I would go parading." Bernstein said she has always admired the Knicks' fight, even in losing seasons. "There are teams that you can tell give up when they're losing. You can just see that the players have had it, but not the Knicks - we fight to the end," she said. For 90-year-old Jesse Meyers, the Knicks' 1973 championship was a major event, but the basketball memory that changed his life happened at the old Madison Square Garden in 1950, when he was 15 years old. Meyers said he participated in a program that invited high school basketball teams to practice with the Knicks before games at the old Madison Square Garden. He had been practicing a hook shot but never made one. When he got onto the Garden floor, standing near Knicks players including Nat "Sweetwater" Clifton, he attempted the shot. "I took my time and I threw one over my head and some freak of nature caused the ball to go in," Meyers said. Then Knicks coach Joe Lapchick put a hand on Meyers' shoulder and told him, "Kid, stay with it." "I didn't bathe for weeks," Meyers said. "The expression 'Stay with it' became a part of my life." Now, as the Knicks chase another championship, Meyers said that lesson still applies. "Kid, stay with it. Just do what you can do, whether it's in sports or in class studies or in your social group," he said. "And that's why I assume, on my tombstone, it's going to say, 'He stayed with the Knicks.'" Henderson-Hobbs offered similar advice to younger Knicks fans. "Stick with your team through the good, through the bad," she said. "It's the same as a marriage. Trust me, you will love the Knicks. As a young person, stick with them and you will be like me. We went through a drought from '73 up until 2026. I'm still with them and I'm still happy and we're going to win. We're going to bring it home. Why? I stuck with my team that I love." (Production: Roselle Chen) For more ABS-CBN News videos, click the link below: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgyY1WylJUmgy6PGn5--qRRixkhltg5hE For more Breaking News & Live Coverage videos, click the link below: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgyY1WylJUmgG2ln-vtKXb-oLlGEZc3sR For more latest news and analysis from ABS-CBN News videos, click the link below: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgyY1WylJUmjA30dKUQCDlG7vy38QQk-Y For more News Digital News Raw Cuts, click the link below: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgyY1WylJUmiOw9mcoSbzoyp25AAZAAdn Subscribe to the ABS-CBN News channel! - http://bit.ly/TheABSCBNNews Watch full episodes on iWant for FREE here: https://iwanttfc.com Visit our website at https://news.abs-cbn.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/abscbnNEWS Twitter: https://twitter.com/abscbnnews Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/abscbnnews #ABSCBNNews #LatestNews