President Donald Trump’s appearance at Madison Square Garden on Monday turned Knicks Game 3 into a security operation that shut down streets, narrowed access and pushed nearby businesses into a scramble. By Tuesday, the people running one bar across from the arena were still dealing with the fallout.
Michael O’Brien, who runs O’Brien’s Bar and Grill on 31st Street, said customers had trouble getting in because security was “beyond tight” and the rules for reaching the block kept changing. He said people were being told different things depending on when they arrived, and that the instructions were shifting every 10 or 15 minutes. “We just hope everyone can get access to the establishment,” he said.
The timing mattered because Monday was the Knicks’ first NBA Finals game at Madison Square Garden since 1999, and Trump’s visit brought a fenced perimeter with limited entry points around the arena. Traffic was blocked from 29th to 35th Streets between 6th and 8th Avenues, and restrictions on what fans could carry into the game were also in place. After the Knicks fell to the San Antonio Spurs, 115-111, a series of arrests followed.
Madison Square Garden Sports Corporation then went public on Tuesday with its frustration, calling city officials the “biggest party poopers” for keeping the restrictions in place. The company said the full closing of areas around MSG would hit celebration and the small businesses that rely on Garden fans for their livelihood. That put it on the same side as owners like O’Brien, even though the arena operator also wanted the perimeter kept intact for security.
O’Brien said the bar has been open upstairs since 2019 and that the Knicks’ recent run had produced wall-to-wall crowds for road games. This was different. “We haven’t seen” anything like it, he said, adding that the team’s surge had brought a level of hype the bar had not experienced before. The problem now is that hype is arriving behind steel fencing and security checkpoints.
Trump will not attend Wednesday’s Game 4, but the Knicks are bringing back their watch party outside the Garden and plan to use a similar security perimeter. That means the same tradeoff remains in place: the Garden wants order, the city wants control, and the businesses just outside the fence are left trying to get customers through the gates and into the room.
For O’Brien, the unanswered question is not whether the crowd will show up. It is how many will make it past the barriers.
