On a small basketball court in bustling South Williamsburg, Malik Kaiser Covington Jr. is running point guard as he and friends from a local high school play half-court on a recent sunny afternoon. The New York Knicks are in the NBA Finals for the first time in more than two decades, and 17-year-old Kaiser Covington and his friends are playing in the shadow of the Berry Street Houses, the public housing development where Jose Alvarado, one of the team’s newest recruits, spent his childhood. Alvarado is the only native New Yorker on the team and wears the number five on his jersey, a number he said he chose in part as a nod to the five boroughs. “ People keep thinking that he's just a random,” Kaiser Covington said of Alvarado. “He's the most underrated player on the Knicks, in my opinion.”

Knicks fans… we’re just hours from game time. The first NBA finals game at Madison Square Garden in over 25-years. It's been a long, strange journey for the Garden Faithful… and if you’re not among them it might be hard to understand why so many people you see outside these days are rocking the team’s signature orange and blue. Joining us now to explain how we got here is WNYC’s Samantha Max. You know her from her criminal justice reporting, but she’s also been digging through our archives here at WNYC to tell the story of the decades leading up to this moment in New York Sports history.

One community organization wants to make sure some of the hundreds of thousands of people who end up at MetLife Stadium spend some time enjoying Newark as well.

One morning, Oliver Sipple went out for a walk. A couple hours later, to his own surprise, he saved the life of the President of the United States. In a story we reported back in 2017, we explain how in the days that followed, Sipple’s split-second act of heroism turned into a rationale for making his personal life into political opportunity. What happens next makes us wonder what a moment, or a movement, or a whole society can demand of one person. And how much is too much? Through newly unearthed archival tape, we hear Sipple himself grapple with some of the most vexing topics of his day and ours - privacy, identity, the freedom of the press - not to mention the bonds of family and friendship. Special thanks to Jerry Pritikin, Michael Yamashita, Stan Smith, Duffy Jennings; Ann Dolan, Megan Filly and Ginale Harris at the Superior Court of San Francisco; Leah Gracik, Karyn Hunt, Jesse Hamlin, The San Francisco Bay Area Television Archive, Mike Amico, Jennifer Vanasco and Joey Plaster.EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Reported by Latif Nasser and Tracie HunteProduced by - Produced by Matt Kielty, Annie McEwen, Latif Nasser and Tracie Hunte. Sign up for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Signup (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org.Leadership support for Radiolab’s science programming is provided by the Simons Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

A deep dive into "Make China Great Again" internet literature.

The commander of Artemis II, Reid Wiseman, on travelling farther from Earth than any humans have gone.

The city is expanding free childcare for two-year-olds this fall. Will that actually convince New York parents to grow their families, though? WNYC reporter Karen Yi tells us about parents who have been going into debt, leaving the workforce, and rethinking second kids while waiting for the city's childcare promises to catch up. Photo: Tim Clayton/Corbis via Getty Images -Got any questions, comments or story ideas? Send us a message at NYCNow@WNYC.org