Jalen Brunson’s sneakers kicked off a comeback in Game 1.
The New York Knicks point guard, 29, ditched his purple Nike Kobe 3s at halftime of Wednesday’s NBA Finals 2026 opener against the San Antonio Spurs and laced up a pair of pale pistachio green Nike Kobe 6s instead.
The results spoke for themselves: Brunson scored just 11 points in the first half, then rattled off 19 points after the switch — including 13 in the final eight minutes — to finish with a game-high 30 points in New York’s 105-95 win.
“Im gonna need Brunson to never wear Kobe 3’s again. Kobe 6’s for the rest of the series,” one fan wrote on X.
Others echoed the sentiment on Instagram, with comments like “He knows the 6s where’s it’s at” and “Kobe 6s get the job done again” flooding sneaker accounts.
As Knicks superfan Spike Lee once declared in his iconic late-’80s Nike ads with Michael Jordan, “It’s gotta be the shoes” — and after Wednesday night, Brunson’s fans seem to wholeheartedly agree.
The Knicks guard hasn’t explained the mid-game change, but he has worn Nike Kobes since high school, and reportedly even turned down his own signature deal with Nike to keep playing in Bryant’s line.
The devotion traces back to Christmas Day 2014, when Bryant handed a teenage Brunson a pair of Kobe 9s at a Lakers-Bulls game in Chicago. Brunson wore the kicks in his next high school game — breaking his team’s color rule in the process — and hasn’t looked back.
Nike has since made Brunson the face of the Kobe Protro series, collaborating with him on exclusive colorways like the sold-out Kobe 6 “Statue of Liberty,” which retailed for $200 but are available on the resale market for more than double that today.
With New York in the Finals for the first time since 1999 and Game 2 tipping off tonight in San Antonio, the only real question is which Kobes Brunson will lace up next.
Smart money’s on the 6s.
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