Spike Lee Says 'F-ck Boston' at Fanatics Fest in NYC: 'The Knicks Have Always Mattered'

Spike Lee had a clear and concise message for the city of Boston, whose Celtics basketball team recently won their league-record 18th NBA championship.

During the Fanatics Fest convention on Saturday, the legendary film director discussed why his hometown team, the New York Knicks, mattered so much to him. Lee is a Knicks superfan and has been a devoted season ticker holder since 1985.

According to the 67-year-old, he's always supported the Knicks, and he was a huge fan of Walt "Clyde" Frazier when he took over the Big Apple and helped the team win their only two championships in 1970 and 1973. However, Lee saved some room to diss the city's longtime sports rival, Boston.

"The Knicks have always mattered," said Lee. "I'm older than a lot of you people in the audience. I grew up with Clyde. I mean, he was my guy way back in the day. So I think that the time is now. And fuck Boston."

New York and Boston are embroiled in an intense rivalry that dates back to the Colonial times. However, sports culture is the bread and butter of this rivalry, as each of the four major American sports has two teams from New York and Boston that are bitter rivals.

There's the New York Rangers and Boston Bruins in the NHL, the New York Jets and New England Patriots in the NFL, and the most heated beef, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox in the MLB. The NBA has seen an evident resurgence of beef between the New York Knicks and Boston Celtics, with many projecting both teams to have played each other in the 2024 Eastern Conference Finals.

Unfortunately, in the semi-finals, the Knicks lost to their other rivals, the Indiana Pacers, while the Celtics made it to the NBA Finals and won the championship. This offseason, the Knicks made several big-time moves, including acquiring Mikael Bridges, which has many believing again that the team will see the Celtics in the Conference Finals next year.