Bill Bradley, Earl Monroe get another chance to show their forever bond that goes much farther than Knicks title
It’s no secret the connection that Knicks fans of a certain generation feel toward the 1972-73 championship-winning squad.But a pair of stars from that team share a deeper connection that was on display Thursday morning in the South Bronx. Speaking before a packed gymnasium at the Earl Monroe New Renaissance Basketball School, two-time NBA champion and former U.S.
senator Bill Bradley spoke from the heart about his friend, one-time on-court rival and eventual Knicks teammate, Earl “The Pearl” Monroe. “The fact that it has Earl Monroe on the [school] name, that might be a little reason why I’m here, but you guys are the reason that makes my heart full.Earl is the reason of my heart, because he is in my heart,” Bradley said with Monroe sitting off to his left and drawing an audible reaction from the school’s students in the crowd.
“When you are a teammate and you go to the top, it’s a forever bond, and we did that twice.” Bradley, 83, added that his appearance Thursday was “one small way for me to say to my friend, I love you.” The two Knicks legends were side by side once again to celebrate the opening of the new 69,000-square-foot facility for the Earl Monroe New Renaissance Basketball School, a specialized charter school in The Bronx whose curriculum is based around basketball and careers beyond the court. The school opened in 2021 and provides its 440 students from grades 9-12 with an education in topics ranging from broadcast, print and digital media to law and marketing. “Everybody can’t play basketball, even though everybody wants to, but there’s so many other aspects of the sports and the game that you can be involved in without being the sports person,” Monroe, 81, said after the event.“I think that this is an excellent way for people to be involved in the sport and still get the same satisfaction as scoring a basket.” The ribbon-cutting ceremony drew a star-studded list of guests, including former Knicks stars Jo...