Jalen Brunson Looks to Carve His Name Into the History Books

Basketball News 03-Jun-2026
Basketball

2026 NBA Finals: Jalen Brunson looks to chisel his name in the history books

New York's guard has a tall task ahead of him in the NBA Finals, but he's already overcome so much just to get here.

Shaun Powell Archive
June 2, 2026 11:46 PM

Little by little, All-Star point guard Jalen Brunson defied basketball common sense and norms.

Complete coverage: 2026 NBA Finals

SAN ANTONIO — This sport does not agree with him strictly from the standpoint of genetics, never has and perhaps never will. This sport is designed to minimize the impact of players like him, diminish their role, keep them in their place. That’s because this is the sport of giants, not gnats. And win a championship? This sport historically and traditionally laughed at the thought of him celebrating and being doused with champagne this time of year.

Yet, he is here, in the 2026 NBA Finals, the best player on his team. And he is four wins away from brushing away all of that stigma like dandruff. Jalen Brunson is in position to take a big step forward, which is somehow diametrically possible for someone who is the shape (6-foot-2) of your average stockbroker.

Take a look at Brunson's top plays and moments from his 2026 NBA Playoffs so far.

That he must slay a 7-foot-5 center to accomplish this feat is the most delicious irony. This puts Brunson in position to not only win a championship for the New York Knicks and halt a 53-year title drought for the franchise, but also to make a statement that’s not exactly lilliputian. If you can compensate for a lack of height — and athletic ability — with otherworldly skills, then nothing is impossible in the NBA. And it’ll take all of that from Brunson to deny Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs.

If anything, though, it’s the Spurs who’ll have the toughest assignment in the series — keep Brunson from crossing them up and knocking them out. He’s that deceptive, that smart, that skilled. That qualified to do so.

San Antonio is coming off a series where they kept two-time MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander in check. Shai is 6-foot-6 and obviously taller, yet much like Brunson — both are ball-dominant guards who think score-first, who create space, who search for and find sweet spots in the mid-range, and who lure defenders into committing fouls or falling off-balance. Shai just had the most efficient season in history by a guard who averaged 30 points. But he shot just 41% against the Spurs in the West Finals, and just 28 from deep. He was tame.

Here’s the thing, though: Brunson will be just as steep of a challenge for the Spurs, maybe slightly more, because OKC had key injuries (Jalen Williams) in that series and therefore throwing double-teams at Shai was easier and less punitive.

Stephon Castle will be the first line of defense for the Spurs. He brings size (6-foot-6) and especially toughness. He checked Deni Avdija in the first round, then spent minutes on Anthony Edwards in the semis, then Shai. He tenaciously accepted those assignments, if only to build his reputation.

“It’s a strong suit of my game,” he said, “just using that to my advantage. Also, just my competitive nature, just wanting those matchups. Just wanting to win so bad, doing whatever it takes. If that means guarding the other team’s best player for 40 minutes a night, then that’s what I’ll do.”

As for Brunson?

“I think what’s worked for me is trying to be physical with him,” Castle said. “He gets to his spots well, uses deception well, has great footwork. I’m just trying to be as disciplined as I can, crowd his space, but not give him the angles that he’s looking for. At this point he’s seen pretty much every coverage, been guarded all kinds of ways. I mean, yeah, just trying to impose my will and use my physicality to my advantage.”

Yet: Brunson has seen his type before, countless times, and conquered those players. Plus: It’s easy to be bigger and stronger than Brunson, much tougher to be smarter while guarding him and avoiding fouls.

The only other option for the Spurs, one that’s unique only to them, is using Wembanyama in drop coverage, to bail out his teammates. Brunson is hellish when it’s one-on-one and on the pick and roll, and he’s averaging 32 points against the Spurs when Wemby plays (an average inflated partly by a 61-point performance two years ago).

“You just have to be super disciplined with him,” said Devin Vassell, who’ll serve as a layer of defense against Brunson. “He’s a very crafty player.”

And a rare one. Brunson is trying to become an outlier, to place himself in a special category. In NBA history, the number of players 6-foot-2 and under to lead their team to a championship can fit into a shot glass. So to speak.

This isn’t about the 1950s, when tall humans were freakish and uncoordinated and a fraction of the population both in and outside of the NBA. Yes, Bob Cousy led the Boston Celtics pre-Bill Russell to a title, but he was one of many in the game at barely over six feet tall. Once the league went vertical, the game changed. There’s a reason why size suddenly mattered once Russell and Wilt Chamberlain became difference-makers, why big men held special value, why they were necessary to win championships far more often than not, for several decades after Cousy.

Isiah Thomas briefly broke the mold by winning back-to-back titles with the Pistons, and this is no disrespect to him, but he wasn’t required to plow through a dominant big man to do so in the 1989 and 1990 NBA Finals. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was old by then. And the Portland Trail Blazers, who were Isiah’s second victim in the championship series, offered nobody imposing.

In this current age of the 3-point shot and widened floor, the game suddenly became sympathetic to the plight of the normal-sized player. Just a bit. That’s why Stephen Curry managed to win four championships with the Warriors, although two were courtesy of 6-foot-10 teammate Kevin Durant, the Finals MVP both times. And that’s it. Until now.

Much of Brunson’s basketball career has been the picture of overcoming his body type. He was a terrific player in high school, but at that level, many normal-sized players lead teams to state titles. At Villanova, he helped win a pair of national championships, no easy feat. Although the most outstanding player in the first of those Final Four teams was Ryan Arcidiacono and the second was Donte DiVincenzo. Strangely, and briefly, both were Brunson’s teammates with the Knicks.

He was a second round pick of the Dallas Mavericks. In hindsight, everyone in the NBA was wrong about his body type, everyone but the Mavericks. And ultimately, even Dallas misjudged Brunson’s star ability, failing to secure him on a long-term deal after drafting him (though that would be rare for a second-rounder). It’s not a stretch to suggest that, in the modern NBA and especially since the draft was shortened to two rounds, no second-rounder with the exception of three-time MVP Nikola Jokic bamboozled so many.

Jalen Brunson talks with the media ahead of Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals.

Therefore, in multiple ways, Brunson is the most improbable player of this generation. Even he labored to recognize his future, to spot and realize the potential. When did this uncertainty creep into his consciousness?

“Probably my rookie year, coming into my rookie season, playing pickup with the team in Dallas, then obviously watching Luka (Dončić) do his thing so effortlessly,” Brunson said. “That was probably the only time. It made me kind of question myself to see how hard I actually had to work to be in the position I wanted to be.”

Little by little, Brunson defied basketball common sense and norms. By the time he arrived in New York a few years ago, he was more than a curiosity. He was a certified starting point guard on a contender, and shortly after, an All-Star, then top NBA scorer. Best of all, for the thirsty Knicks, he’s a potential championship piece. Finally!

New York City is demanding but also warmly embracing, to the point of suffocating, when Gotham’s professional athletes earn that trust, that respect. Brunson is the city’s hope, more than Carmelo Anthony, even more than the last celebrated Knicks giant, Patrick Ewing. Neither won a championship. Such a big city, such a small (literally speaking) player, such a great partnership, both made for each other. And it’s Brunson who casts the larger shadow, if only because right now, he runs New York. He’s in the championship round. He has a chance.

“It’s pretty surreal,” he said. “I’m not gonna lie.”

Shaun Powell has covered the NBA since 1985. You can e-mail him at [email protected], find his archive here and follow him on X.

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