With the 2024-25 NBA season nearly two months away, the New York Knicks continue to make headlines across the league. This time the team is honoring one of its own, as New York announced this past Tuesday, August 6, that star point guard Jalen Brunson will be the 36th captain in franchise history.
The Knicks haven’t had a captain since the 2018-19 season when Lance Thomas held the role.
Born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, Brunson was a five-star recruit out of Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Illinois. He showed signs of what was to come, leading his high school team to multiple state championship runs.
Brunson officially signed with Villanova in 2014, choosing to work with the legendary Jay Wright and the Wildcats over other top schools like Illinois College.
He immediately became a starter and focal point of a team searching for its first NCAA championship since 1985, and second in franchise history. After having a terrific season that saw Villanova reach number one in the AP poll for the first time ever, Brunson helped lead the team to a national championship win etching himself in school history.
The former Wildcat would go on to play two more seasons for Villanova. In 2016, he earned his second national championship win along with being named the National Player of the Year, solidifying himself as a Villanova legend.
Brunson declared for the 2018 NBA draft, in which he was taken with the 33rd overall pick by the Dallas Mavericks. Despite being drafted lower than expected, he carved a role for himself as a sixth man in a competitive Mavericks rotation led by Luka Doncic.
Over his first few years, he showed flashes of his stardom from high school and college, but wasn’t getting the same success. Brunson stayed humble and waited for his opportunity to show off his talent.
In his fourth season with the Mavericks, he would go on to post career highs of 16.3 points and 4.8 assists per game as a starter. Brunson then went on to have an outstanding playoff performance averaging 21.6 points in 18 games as the clear second option behind Doncic. The two stars led the Mavericks to the Western Conference Finals where they were defeated by the future 2022 NBA champs, the Golden State Warriors.
Brunson’s extraordinary play in the playoffs gave him an opportunity to earn a lot more money. The New York Knicks decided to take a chance on him and agreed to a four-year, $104 million contract to be the starting point guard and the undisputed leader of his own team.
Now, in just two seasons with the Knicks, Brunson has proven he deserves to represent the city of New York.
The newly named captain is coming off a career year with averages of 28.7 points and 6.7 assists per game on 47.9% shooting from the field and 40.1% from three-point range. He has led the team to 13 playoff wins in the last two seasons compared to just one win in the previous 10 years before his Knicks debut. Brunson also has more playoff points (591) than Carmelo Anthony (589) in two fewer games and five fewer seasons.
Brunson’s impact in such a short time is astonishing and is a testament of the leader he is on and off the court. The New York Knicks Captain will look to do what he does best this upcoming season and for seasons to come: win a championship.
