Pepsi turned the Knicks’ latest playoff surge into a citywide ad campaign after New York’s comeback win in Game 4 of the NBA Finals, turning fan photos into digital billboards around New York under a new installment of its long-running “Knicks Fans Deserve Pepsi” series called “We Outside.” The rollout gives the brand a fresh way to ride the moment while keeping the faces on the screens rooted in bars, street corners and watch parties across the city.
That matters now because New York is still living inside the buzz from a Game 4 that became the biggest comeback in NBA Finals history, and the marketing is moving as fast as the series itself. Pepsi said every face in the campaign is a real fan, and the company tapped photographers @shottinyc and Jack Underwood to capture reactions in the places where Knicks emotions spill out in public. Underwood, who helped photograph fans at bars, on street corners and at watch parties, is part of the campaign’s claim to be built from the ground up, even as it is also a polished brand push designed to keep the playoff energy on the street and on screen. That same mix of local pride and commercial timing has become a feature of this postseason, with related Knicks marketing visible from Vogue, Baked By Melissa, Michelob Ultra and JP Morgan Chase.
Pepsi’s move is not happening in a vacuum. The company has sponsored the Knicks since 2018, and it spent weeks before this launch running a scavenger hunt that sent fans to bodegas and pizza restaurants looking for limited-edition Knicks collector cans. Each can hid a pair of suite tickets to Game 2, with one pair planted in each of the five boroughs and clues dropped on social media, a setup that turned the city into part treasure hunt and part ticket chase. The campaign’s public face may be fan-first, but the mechanics are unmistakably branded: it uses real supporters, curated images and a playoff win to sell the feeling back to the same crowd that created it.
The timing also tracks with how much attention the Knicks are drawing. Game 3 pulled a Nielsen-measured 23.8 million average viewers on ABC/, the strongest Game 3 result for the NBA Finals since 1998, which helps explain why a sponsor would keep leaning in as the series shifts away from New York. On Saturday, the series moves to San Antonio for Game 5, and that is where the next test begins: whether the Knicks can carry the same edge on the road that Pepsi has now wrapped in a campaign and put on billboards across the city.
For now, the answer is that New York’s playoff moment has become a marketing asset, but one built on actual fan faces and actual fan noise. Pepsi is selling the atmosphere it helped amplify, and the city is already reading it back on the street.
