Jalen Brunson and Harrison Barnes give Dallas Mavericks fans two familiar names to watch as the Spurs and Knicks meet again on the NBA Finals stage.
The last time the San Antonio Spurs and New York Knicks met in the NBA Finals was 1999, when Tim Duncan and David Robinson dispatched a scrappy Knicks team in five games to win the franchise’s first championship. Twenty-seven years later, they are back on the same stage. This time, Victor Wembanyama is the centerpiece in San Antonio and Jalen Brunson is carrying New York to its first Finals appearance since that series.
Game 1 tips off Wednesday night at Frost Bank Center at &:30 p.m. CT on ABC and for Dallas Mavericks fans, there are two former Mavs to cheer for on both rosters.
Jalen Brunson is a name Mavericks fans know well. Dallas selected him No. 33 overall in 2018, developed him into a legitimate starting guard and watched him become one of the most important players in the 2022 Western Conference Finals run. With Luka Doncic injured during the first round against Utah, Brunson averaged 27.8 points per game during that series and helped keep the Mavericks alive. It was the moment that proved that Brunson could be the leader he is today on another team.
Nico Harrison chose not to offer Brunson an extension and the guard signed with the Knicks on a four-year, $104 million deal. He never looked back. Four years later, Brunson has led New York to the NBA Finals after winning Eastern Conference Finals MVP unanimously. He averaged 25.5 points, 7.8 assists and 3.3 rebounds as the Knicks swept Cleveland.
Jalen Brunson joined Kobe Bryant and Stephen Curry as the only players in league history to average at least 26 points and six assists during an 11-game winning streak in a single postseason. Dallas let him leave for nothing and now he is four wins away from a championship.
Harrison Barnes is on the other side of the matchup. The former Mavericks forward spent parts of three seasons in Dallas after signing in 2016 before being traded to Sacramento in 2019. He spent five seasons with the Kings before being traded to San Antonio during the 2024 offseason. Now 33, Barnes has found his way to one more chance to compete for a championship.
His regular-season average of 9.9 points per game shows he is not the focal point of this Spurs team, but his playoff role has been exactly what San Antonio needed. Barnes is a veteran presence on one of the league's youngest rosters. He's been a great floor spacer alongside Wembanyama, but most importantly, he brings championship experience to a group experiencing these moments for the first time. Also on the bench is associate head coach Sean Sweeney, who spent 5 seasons under Jason Kidd as an assistant before leaving for San Antonio this past offseason.
His 38.8% shooting from 3-point range during the regular season provides the kind of spacing that helps make everything around Wembanyama work.
