Knicks requiring fans who attend games in next round to be vaccinated
ATLANTA — If the Knicks advance, Madison Square Garden is going fully vaxxed.
The club announced it will only sell tickets in the second round of the playoffs to vaccinated individuals, opening up the possibility of something at least close to a capacity crowd. In the first round against the Hawks, roughly 10% of the crowd has been unvaccinated and required to socially distance in a separate section.
Cutting out the unvaccinated means owner James Dolan can fill his roughly 20,000-capacity arena. Fans are required to provide “valid” proof of a full vaccination, although that can be only a cellphone photo of a vaccination card (which are supposed to be crosschecked with IDs).
The Garden also accepts the New York State Excelsior pass as digital proof of vaccination.
An exception is made for children under 16, who can sit in the vaccinated section with proof of a negative COVID-19 test. Unvaccinated children are required to wear a mask in their seats unless eating or drinking.
In the opening round against the Hawks, about 15,000 attended Game 1 and about 16,000 were at Game
2. The games were billed as the largest indoor events in New York since the pandemic started, and ended in a split before Friday’s Game 3 in Atlanta.
The Garden crowd was raucous, skewed young and with a college-like atmosphere replacing the corporate vibe. It brought negative energy and attention as well, with profane chants directed at Hawks point guard Trae Young.
Near the end of Game 2, a Knicks fan wearing a Julius Randle shirt spat on Young from his seat. The Garden investigated the incident and banned the fan “indefinitely.” Young reportedly declined to press charges.
“There’s no place for that,
man,” Randle said Friday. “I don’t care if it’s our home crowd or not, there’s no place for that. We’ve got to protect the players. That’s disrespectful. Yeah, it’s our fans and I love our fans, but you see a guy on the street, you wouldn’t spit on him. You wouldn’t disrespect somebody like that. I don’t care what arena it’s in, whose fan base it is, there’s absolutely no place for disrespecting anybody in any capacity and especially spitting on him. That’s just ridiculous.”
If the Knicks advance to the second round, they’d likely play the top-seeded Sixers (who are up 2-0 in their series against the Wizards).