Celebrations following Game 4 of the NBA Finals descended into chaos near Madison Square Garden on Wednesday night. Police arrested 56 people and 10 officers sustained injuries, the New York Police Department announced Thursday.
Up to 10,000 fans flooded the streets north of Madison Square Garden between Fifth and Eighth avenues, setting off fireworks, blocking traffic, climbing scaffolding and attempting to flip a taxi, among other dangerous acts, police said. Crowd-control efforts left ten NYPD officers injured, including one who was struck in the head with a glass bottle, police said.
The disturbances erupted hours after Madison Square Garden canceled its official Game 4 watch party amid a public dispute with the city over security restrictions. The decision followed a day after Madison Square Garden officials blasted the NYPD and Mayor Zohran Mamdani over the city’s security plan, which included a vast perimeter and other restrictions for Game 4, even though President Donald Trump did not attend as he had Monday.
“This is an exciting time for the Knicks and for fans across New York City. The NYPD wants New Yorkers to be able to enjoy these celebrations, but our primary responsibility is to ensure that everyone can do so safely,” the department said in a statement Thursday. “Once again, there were large crowds of people who engaged in incredibly reckless and dangerous behavior last night both during and after the game. This demonstrates exactly why the NYPD has increased our presence in and around Madison Square Garden.”
James Dolan, the owner of the arena and the New York Knicks, blamed Mamdani and the police commissioner throughout an interview with WFAN Sports Radio on Wednesday.
The continued restrictions were “designed around stopping people from celebrating around Madison Square Garden,” Dolan said, adding that the arena would not put up screens as a result.
Mamdani fired back at Dolan on X before Wednesday’s game, saying, “MSG requested a permit for a watch party for 500-999 fans. We approved that permit for 999 fans.”
An NYPD spokesperson echoed Mamdani’s statement, telling CNN that officers had set up for the watch party, adding, “You would have to ask MSG why they aren’t following through.”
“Madison Square Garden and the New York Knicks declined to use the permit that was granted by Mayor Mamdani’s office due to the fact that only 1,000 people would be allowed into the area and they would need to be ticketed, leaving the tens of thousands of people who want to come to The Garden to celebrate the Knicks out in the cold,” MSG Sports said in a statement. “We did not think it was fair to just allow a small group to celebrate outside The Garden when everybody else was being shut out.”
Two additional watch parties Wednesday at Central Park’s Wollman Rink and Brooklyn Bowl reached capacity before the game began, according to an NBA webpage. Neither of those watch parties required tickets.
Despite the canceled watch party, a crowd of fans still gathered outside Madison Square Garden behind metal barricades to cheer and show their support for the Knicks.
The Knicks went on to win Game 4 against the San Antonio Spurs – pulling off the greatest comeback in NBA Finals history – as many fans watched on their phones.
“We were actually hearing the screams and the cheers before we saw it on our phone – so that’s how we knew that good things were happening in this game for the Knicks,” CNN’s Mark Morales reported from outside the arena.
Inside the venue, high-profile celebrities again attended the game, including Taylor Swift, who wore a blue-and-orange “Stevie Knicks” T-shirt. Actor Sydney Sweeney and her boyfriend, music executive Scooter Braun, also made an appearance.
Former New York City Mayor Eric Adams called the watch party’s cancellation “bullsh*t” as he entered the arena.
This week marked the first time the NBA Finals had returned to New York City in nearly three decades. The Knicks lead the series 3-1 heading into Game 5 on Saturday in San Antonio.
Postgame chaos and arrests
Videos of rowdy fans circulated on social media in the hours after the game. The disturbances included people taking over streets and blocking traffic, jumping on moving vehicles, attempting to flip a taxi, setting off fireworks in dense crowds, climbing scaffolding and light poles, throwing glass bottles and other objects at officers and bystanders, and breaking into a tractor-trailer to steal items that were then hurled at police and the crowd, according to police. Authorities said the incidents significantly damaged four NYPD vehicles, shattering front and back windshields.
At multiple locations, crowds refused repeated orders to disperse, police said. Of the 56 people taken into custody, officers released 41 with criminal court summonses, while 15 were arrested. Charges against those arrested included assault on a police officer, criminal possession of a weapon — a knife — reckless endangerment, criminal mischief, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, obstruction of governmental administration and trademark counterfeiting, police said.
The NYPD also said bars and restaurants inside the secure zone around Madison Square Garden remained busy throughout the game, with some drawing long lines — a point that pushes back on criticism from arena ownership, which had argued the security perimeter would shut out fans and hurt nearby businesses.
Earlier incidents
Wednesday’s incidents follow a pattern of unrest tied to the series. The latest dispute over security followed multiple violent incidents tied to Monday’s game, plus a stabbing Sunday at Penn Station — directly under the Garden — that left six people hurt. On Monday night, police took 21 people into custody at a watch party of roughly 7,000 people in Bryant Park that turned violent and destructive, according to a law enforcement official. Two of those arrested were charged with assaulting a police officer, and five officers were injured, the official said.
Separately, a 39-year-old man wearing a Spurs jersey was stomped and punched after Game 3 while walking down West 47th Street, about 15 blocks from the arena. Video shows people jeering the man before attacking him in an attempt to rip off his jersey. After the man tried to defend himself and push people away, attackers took him to the ground from behind and kicked him before stealing his cellphone, according to the NYPD. The victim was hospitalized in stable condition.
Strict security for Game 4
Watch parties had been held outside the Garden for every other game in the Knicks’ playoff run except one, which organizers canceled due to rain, before they stopped during the last round of play against the Cleveland Cavaliers after the NYPD said it would not support the gatherings following crowd problems, an arena official told CNN.
That made the temporary return of the watch party outside MSG on Wednesday – even under tighter security – a win for fans, city officials said, before officials canceled it.
The city’s security plan Wednesday included crowd-control measures in and around the arena, including a security zone similar to the one implemented Monday, when Trump attended and sat with Dolan. Those restrictions “were supposedly to thwart any threats related to the president’s attendance,” the arena spokesperson said.
“We now know these restrictions were never about the President – it was just a convenient excuse to restrict how and when Knicks fans celebrate,” the spokesperson said Tuesday night in a statement that blasted city officials and the NYPD and called Mamdani and Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch “New York City’s biggest party poopers.”
Under Wednesday’s security plan, officials would have barred everyone from entering the secure area starting at 4 p.m. unless they had a ticket to the game or watch party, a train ticket for Penn Station, were heading to a business, lived in the area, had credentials or had some other authorized reason to be there. The restrictions essentially mirrored those in place Monday for Trump’s visit. Officials would have screened everyone entering the secure area.
Mamdani said earlier Wednesday the security measures were in line with those the NYPD uses for gatherings of this size, including July 4 and New Year’s Eve.
For comparison, the last time organizers held a Knicks watch party outside the Garden – during Friday’s Game 2 played in San Antonio – about 6,500 people attended, an NYPD spokesperson told CNN. Police made 26 arrests, including one person who punched one officer before biting another.
Leave a Reply