Boy Pays Tribute to 9/11 Victim Grandfather He Never Met: “Knicks in Five”

Friday’s 9/11 remembrance ceremony in Lower Manhattan marked 25 years since the attacks. In the middle of it, a young boy stood up and thanked a grandfather he’d never met for a New York Knicks championship.

Every year, families and friends of those killed on September 11, 2001, take turns reading the names of victims at the ceremony held at Ground Zero. This year, one boy used his time at the podium to speak directly to his grandfather, Andrew Ira Rosenblum. Rosenblum worked at Cantor Fitzgerald, the firm that lost more employees on 9/11 than any other company in the World Trade Center, and died in the attacks.

“My grandfather and my namesake, Andrew Ira Rosenblum,” the boy said. “Grandpa Andrew, me and my brothers hear so much about you. You blessed us with the Knicks, and this year we got our first championship. Knicks in five.”

“Knicks in Five” Meets a Grandson Who Never Got to See It

The line landed exactly as it was meant to. This past June, the Knicks won their first NBA title in 53 years, closing out a 4-1 Finals victory over the San Antonio Spurs behind a stretch run where they took 15 of their final 16 games. “Knicks in five” has since become something of a rallying cry among fans of the franchise, and hearing it invoked at a memorial ceremony gave the moment an unusual mix of heartbreak and warmth.

He wasn’t finished, either. In the same breath, he pivoted to the city’s other long-suffering franchise. “You also cursed us with the Jets,” he continued. “We’re still waiting on that one.”

The line drew laughs even in the middle of an otherwise somber ceremony, a small reminder of how sports weave themselves into everyday family life in New York, generation to generation, even for a grandson who never got the chance to actually watch a game with his grandfather.

He closed with the part that mattered most. “We never got to meet you,” he said. “We’ll always remember you. We love you. God bless America.”

Moments like this have become part of what makes the annual ceremony so difficult and so human at once. Alongside stories of loss, families use their few seconds at the microphone to update the people they lost on everything that’s happened since, weddings, graduations, and in this case, a championship a grandfather never got to see but somehow still “blessed” his grandsons with.

For Knicks fans, the team’s title run has already taken on a life beyond basketball this year. This is simply the latest reminder of how far that moment traveled, all the way to a ceremony built around remembering the people the city lost, and the family still finding ways to include them in everything, even a Knicks banner going up at Madison Square Garden.

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