When Knicks fans are banned from Madison Square Garden, is there any coming back?
AS THE FINAL SECONDS ticked away on the New York Knicks' playoff thrashing of the Boston Celtics in May and the mad revelers of Bing Bong Nation poured out of Madison Square Garden, Justin Brandel sorted through a tangle of emotions. He was watching in amazement from his Manhattan apartment and trying to keep up with the text thread blowing up his phone -- his friends, fellow Knicks fans, hazarding guesses about how much the cheapest tickets would cost for Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals. $800 just to get in the door? $1,000? $1,500? Screw it, it's worth it, his friends said. The last time the Garden hosted Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals was 1994. There's a real chance we'll all be dead before this happens again. These are the Knicks, after all.
As friends began to commit, Brandel itched to join them. Money wasn't the issue. He makes a good living as a personal injury lawyer in the city. His problem, however, is that he was legally forbidden from entering Madison Square Garden -- banned by James Dolan, the CEO of MSG Sports and MSG Entertainment.
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