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Farewell Captain: Remembering Willis Reed
Looking back at the career and legacy of one of the greatest Knicks to grace the halls of Madison Square Garden
I was born in 1987, and since the age of 8, I have been a fan of the New York Knicks. I was born 14 years after the Knicks won their last championship in 1973. In my time as a fan of this team, I have seen some truly dreadful basketball. But I have also experienced great moments of playoff success during the Patrick Ewing era, the marvelous scoring spectacle that was the Carmelo Anthony era, and the up-and-down experience that has been the Julius Randle era. But as fun as those eras were, that doesn’t compare to the dynamic group of Knicks from the early 1970s.
Many people associate those teams with the “Rolls Royce Backcourt” of Clyde Frazier and Earl Monroe, or the trivia fact that coaching legend Phil Jackson played for this Knicks team. They might even recall that former senator Bill Bradley was once upon a time a great professional basketball player. But every team has a foundation, the glue that holds them together. And for that Knicks team, it was center Willis Reed. Reed passed away recently at the age of 80, leaving behind fond memories and a legacy of a great basketball player and an even better man.
