Stephen A. Smith did not want to talk about Donald Trump on the night the New York Knicks finally won the title they had chased for 53 years. Asked after the Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs 94-90 in Game 5 of the NBA Finals at Frost Bank Center, Smith said he was not in the mood for politics and wanted only to celebrate the championship.
He said he had waited all his life for the moment and that the win mattered more than anything else at that instant. “The Knicks just won the title. I don't give a s--- about politics or anything like that,” he said, adding that the team had ended a 53-year drought and that he did not want anything to get in the way of it.
The reaction landed at a moment when Smith’s name had already become part of a larger back-and-forth with Trump. Smith had spent several days criticizing Trump’s appearance at Game 3 at Madison Square Garden, saying Trump had no business showing up in New York City for the game and that he would blame him if the Knicks lost. Trump later replied that Smith seemed like a nice guy but did not appear to have the aptitude to run for president, and he questioned whether Smith had the IQ for it.
Smith, who said he is a lifelong New York Knick fan born in the Bronx and raised in Hollis, Queens, chose not to reopen that fight after the championship. He told News Digital and OutKick that the argument was the furthest thing from his mind and that the title was what he had been waiting for all his life. His focus was on the end of the drought, not on settling a political score.
That pause matters because it leaves the feud in an unfinished place even as the basketball story closed. Smith went on the next day with an American flag behind him and presidential music in the background, a reminder that the exchange had already spilled well beyond the court. For now, though, the last word belonged to the championship, and Smith made clear he was not giving Trump one back.
