Following the New York Knicks’ win in the NBA Cup championship game against the San Antonio Spurs, it was announced that they had no plans to raise a banner in their home arena. That’s a sharp contrast from the two previous NBA Cup winners in the Los Angeles Lakers and Milwaukee Bucks, respectively, both of whom displayed championship banners.
That’s led to the question as to whether or not those teams might take their banners down in light of the Knicks’ decision, with NBA insider Chris Haynes weighing in during a recent segment on Sirius XM NBA Radio. And Haynes believes that it’s possible the Lakers might ultimately decide to take down their banner commemorating their NBA Cup championship.
“I think the Lakers might remove that banner now,” Haynes said. “They didn’t want to put it up. Now that the Knicks are holding this stance, the Lakers are gonna be like, ‘listen, we didn’t want to do that, we compromised, and we got his long, white, whatever color banner it is hanging up there that we don’t want up there. Let’s put it down.’”
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Whether or not the Lakers actually decide to remove the banner is uncertain, and it’s not yet clear if they’ve even had those internal discussions. But what was true is that the Lakers apparently did not want to hang the banner to begin with. It was reported that the team felt pressure from the NBA to eventually hang one in the rafters.
The Bucks, the winners of the second in-season tournament, also decided to hang a banner in their arena.