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It isn’t just celebrity guests on the court that are heading to Madison Square Garden for the NBA Finals this week. One Knicks icon has agreed to join ESPN for the team’s first trip to the Finals in 27 years.
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According to USA Today, former Knicks guard Jeremy Lin will be joining ESPN for the NBA Finals starting with Game 1 in San Antonio. He will be making his debut on Wednesday for SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt in Washington D.C.
Linsanity at the Garden
Speaking to the outlet, Lin said he’s always believed the Knicks fans deserve the best from the team and wishes he could have given more to the team over a longer period of time back in 2012.
“I always felt like Knicks fans deserve the best performances. They’re so passionate,” Lin said. “And as cool as it was for me to give good performances only for that stretch of time, I genuinely wish that I was able to do more. I genuinely wish I was able to stay longer, genuinely wish that I could have a lot more success and done things in the playoffs for the Knicks, but that never came to fruition.”
As for Lin’s role at ESPN, he intends to bring his experience in several seasons for different teams to give keener insight as to the action on the court.
“The goal for me is really how do I bring my previous experience and distill the complexities into something simple and digestible for the fans?” Lin said. “And that’s not just the successes. It’s the failures of multiple first-round exits before I was able to be a part of a team that was able to win it all. And seeing what worked, what didn’t work or what was the differentiator in getting us over the top, those are the things that I want to talk about.”
Lin made his TV debut in March as a guest on NBA Today. He intends to lean on his experience from his three days for the show to prepare himself.
“I think after those three days, the reception that we got from the fans as well as what I felt internally was definitely beyond what I expected,” Lin said. “So that was nice in the sense of like, oh, people had really appreciated the breakdown, but I also felt joy in being back in NBA basketball.”
In February 2012, Lin emerged as a star for a brief period of time. He had six straight games of at least 20 points, coming out of nowhere to give the team new life, not to mention seven straight wins that lifted them from 8-15 to 15-5.
The Knicks went on to make the playoffs that year, but an injured Lin did not appear and left the team in the ensuing offseason.
“Linsanity” remains one of the most iconic periods of Knicks basketball over the past 25 years. As a result, Lin remains a fan favorite, and even has Karl-Anthony Towns as one of his biggest fans.
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This story was originally published June 2, 2026 at 1:18 PM.