January 23, 2007
The Final List Is Revealed
Over the weekend on NBC and last night on MSG, the final five moments of the “50 Greatest Moments on MSG” were shown. Spoiler Alert, don’t keep reading if you don’t want to know about this yet.
In a somewhat confusing result, the #1 moment was actually from two games, games 5+7 of the 1970 NBA Finals. Game 7 is legendary to Knicks’ fans as it was when Willis Reed limped onto the court after being injured previously in the series, but apparently the panel of experts felt that the two belonged together. (Interestingly, online voters placed that #37th)
Rounding out the Top-5 were: Rangers winning the Cup in 1994, Ali-Frazier in 71, the Concert for New York after 9/11 and the Pope’s visit in 1979. Viewers put the Rangers’ first home game after 9/11 as #1 followed by the cup victory, Elvis selling out the Garden in 1972, Gretzky retiring in 1999 and Stephane Matteau’s game-winner in the ’94 conference semifinals.
Overall, the ten-week series has been enjoyable to watch and a fun look back and some of the great moments in New York sports and New York in general. Sadly, with the current state of things at the Garden, they probably won’t have to update the list anytime soon. What were your reactions to the series?
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Great series, made you want to watch to see what got in there. Every real New Yorker has their own Garden moment ... personal or professional.
I know that Wayne Gretzky is The Great One, but he didn't really do anything for the Rangers, so I objected to that being in the top ten over Messier's retirement ceremony.
And while the Concert for New York was a big deal, musically it wasn't that great. I think Marilyn Monroe singing happy birthday to JFK is much more iconic.
i find it interesting that the public put 7 hockey related events in the top-10. i wonder if that's because the rangers have been decent lately and the knicks have sucked.
The 2nd Greatest MSG Moment will be when the Knicks fire "that little con man" Isaiah Thomas.
The GREATEST MSG Moment will be when/if the Knicks are pried from the clutches of little ne'er-do-well Jimmy Dolan so that he can focus on his music career.
the greatest moment will be when we hang dolan from the rafters next to ewing's jersey.
The series was done well except for taking forever to finally get to the top 5. With MSG's "jam-packed" schedule one episode would get repeated for days on end. I felt like I kept seeing the same episode over and over again.
Rangers winning the cup was by far my top moment, but I can't really speak for stuff I didn't grow up watching. I really have to disagree with the concert for new york being up so high. Just because something was "post 9/11" doesn't mean it was necessarily a great historic event. The concert for bangladesh was a better show, and was before its time, preceding today's corporatized mega-benefits.
I dont' see how its in the same league as the other top events. Even if you weren't there, people remember exactly where they were when the Rangers won the cup or when Willis Reed limped onto the court. Ali-Frazier is one of the most historic sporting events of all time, period.