NBA FINALS: KNICKS VS. SPURS

June 3, 2026

Mike Brown

New York Knicks

Game 1: Pregame

MIKE BROWN: I'd like to start off real quick by passing along my condolences to Coach Adelman's family. You know, obviously I knew Rick. I wasn't really close to him but from afar, you talk about a fantastic human being. His record and his accomplishments speak for themselves. So I'd like to pass along my condolences to all his family, David, and anybody else that knew him and is associated with him.

We lost a great person in Coach Adelman.

Q. What's the latest on Mitchell Robinson?

MIKE BROWN: I literally just got here. I'm supposed to speak to the medical group when I get done here. But I have not talked to him yet.

Q. You've mentioned Pop as one of your mentors for a long time. In a series against the Spurs, do you reach out to him for advice or is it radio silence? How does that work?

MIKE BROWN: He's savvy. He's very competitive, and if I reached out to him and asked him for some advice, he'd give me some BS that worked against us.

So I can't reach out to him. And I said "BS" because I went to dinner with my mom last night, and she reprimanded me for the first 30 minutes because I think I said "ass" -- sorry, Mom -- she said that I have a 3-year-old grandson that's about to turn four and I have people looking up to me so I've got to watch my mouth.

So I apologize, Mom.

Q. You've said a lot during this postseason run that you could learn things from losses but you can also learn things in victory. On this 11-game winning streak, what have you learned about your team that you maybe didn't know before?

MIKE BROWN: You know, that they are resilient, and I've said that before. Because it hasn't all been smooth sailing. You know, you're down 22 in Game 1 against Cleveland at home with seven minutes to go, and you know, I've been around a long time. You know, I've seen big comebacks but not in that short amount of time.

So for our guys to just stay with it, stay with it, stay with it, keep trying to fight and find a way was remarkable. It's happened throughout the course of this run. That's probably the biggest thing I've learned from those guys.

Q. As someone who was here with you in 2007 when you walked up into the Finals, I was just a year younger than I am now, but you being 19 years older than you are today, what's the difference walking in as the head coach of the Finals with all the experience you've gained in, really, it's been two decades?

MIKE BROWN: At that time, I had a tendency as a young guy to get too high or too low at times. I feel like I've been fortunate, blessed, lucky, all of the above, to be a part of a lot of different opportunities, fantastic opportunities in this league, and now, you know, I'm pretty even-keeled.

It's a big game. You love being here. Definitely not life or death. There are a lot of other people out in the world that are facing higher stressful situations than I'm in right now, and so I'm able to enjoy the moment, while not getting too high or too low during this time.

Q. Mikal Bridges has had a lot of ups and downs over the two years in New York. What, if anything, has impressed you about how he has persevered to get to this point where he's playing at this level at this stage?

MIKE BROWN: Just the biggest thing is it's part of the resiliency that I was talking about with our whole team. He's got a confidence within him that's amazing. Because he's -- I've said it before, he's unfairly gotten beat up a couple of times, and I know that I could have helped him better. I could have put him in a better position to have more success this year.

And I've got to keep learning how to do that, not just for him but for some other guys or our team to help him, especially in time of need. But his confidence, the support system around him, has been remarkable, and it hasn't seemed like it fazed him much because of those two things.

Q. You mentioned that your temperament is kind of even-keeled. What about that mindset has allowed you to hold onto that throughout your career as a coach?

MIKE BROWN: You know, I've kind of always been like that. Never got too high or too low, or at least I try. You always try to give people and/or situations the benefit of the doubt. You know, we all have gone through a lot of crazy things, probably, in our lives. Life, I feel like, is too short to try to overreact to many things.

I try to stay right here. I think I got that from my mom, my dad to a certain degree, too. And it helps a ton, especially in this business where there's a lot of people that have good and bad opinions about you.

Q. You and Coach Johnson had very similar first jobs in terms of expectations, lots of media attention, budding superstar, and I wonder how you as a young head coach learned to trust your voice and to trust what you were seeing and be willing to say whatever needed to be said to whomever it needed to be said to.

MIKE BROWN: You know, first of all, he's light-years in front of me. He's a way better coach than I was when I was a young guy.

You know, the job that he's done is fantastic. It's second-to-none. He's got a great guy to help him out in Pop around. Not only does he have Pop around, but you see Manu, you see Tim Duncan. You see David Robinson, even Sean Elliott. You have those guys around as players that can not only give you guidance here and there but also uplift you when you're down and some other things.

So to have that support system around with the knowledge that he has already as a young coach is phenomenal. I don't know him well, but I know he appreciates the situation that he's in because he's blessed, lucky and fortunate, all of the above, like I said earlier. The only thing is, I think even though he went to Stanford, I went to University of San Diego, I'm a better player than him. That might be the only advantage that I have, but we're not playing.

You know, it's just one of those things, man. You just -- as a young guy, you try to do the best you can; and as you get older, hopefully you learn from the ups and the downs that you have along the way, and you try to correct them as time goes on.