Stephen A. Smith doesn’t want to see President Donald Trump at Madison Square Garden for the NBA Finals.
The scene there is already expected to be crazy enough with the Knicks two wins away from winning their first NBA championship since 1973.
The ESPN star believes the presence of the Commander-in-Chief will only unnecessarily add to it on Monday night, with Trump planning to attend at least Game 3 against the Spurs.
I don’t want him there,” Smith said on his SiriusXM radio show Friday.
He insisted it has “nothing to do with politics,” but believes that Trump’s being there could only make an already circus-like atmosphere worse. Knicks have been filling the city streets with wild postgame celebrations outside the Garden, in Times Square and other places during the run.
“It has everything to do with him disrupting and contributing at the same time to the chaos that’s going to be existing at Madison Square Garden,” Smith said. “If it were Barack Obama coming to the Garden, I would say, ‘Stay home. Stay at the White House.’
“I have been covering sports for over 30 years. And I’m telling you right now, come Monday, for Game 3 of the NBA Finals at Madison Square Garden, I expect to see an environment I have never seen in my entire career covering sports. You don’t understand. You don’t understand.”
Trump, like Smith, is a native New Yorker and has a long history of attending high-profile Knicks games long before his political aspirations. He has become a regular at UFC events at MSG and Prudential Center and attended the 2025 Super Bowl in New Orleans and U.S. Open men’s tennis final that same year.
Trump planned on attending Game 5 of the Eastern Conference finals, but the Knicks swept away the Cavaliers.
“I was invited to. I was going to go on Wednesday [Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals], but they closed it out very quickly. They’re great, and Jim Dolan’s a great guy — he’s, as you know, owns and in charge of Madison Square Garden. He’s having a good year,” Trump told The Post’s Emily Goodin on May 27.
“Boy, what a team! They win all their games. They really have some great players. I think I’ll be going to one of the games, yeah. I was invited by numerous people, and Jim, and I think it’s great. Great to see it. The Knicks have really, they’ve really suffered for years and they’re doing right now very well.”
The Knicks hold a 2-0 lead over the Spurs in the series after a nail-biting 105-104 win in Game 2 on Friday night. The team has won 13 straight playoff games and needs just two more wins to claim its first championship in 53 years.
