Karl-Anthony Towns felt his late mother's presence during Game 1 of the NBA Finals

It’s been six years since Karl-Anthony Towns lost his mother, Jacqueline Cruz-Towns; however, the former Cat still felt her presence during one of the biggest games of his life.

Towns finished with 18 points and 12 rebounds in New York’s 105-95 win over San Antonio in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. Even though it was his first NBA Finals appearance — and the Knicks’ first since 1999 — Towns said he was eerily calm throughout, which he attributed to his mother, who was watching from above.

“To be honest with y’all, I don’t want to sound sugar-coating or anything like that, but Shaq, you would know what I’m saying,” Towns said during his postgame interview on ESPN. “I don’t know what it was, but I just felt a calm and a peace that I don’t know, had to be coming from the woman above, so I felt really confident about today. I felt good. I felt like a kid. It was just fun out here. This was something that, as a kid, you always dream about. You always hope that — you just hope to be an NBA player, let alone to be in the NBA Finals.”

“I felt like a kid. It was just fun out here.”

Karl-Anthony Towns shares the sense of peace he felt going into Game 1 of the NBA Finals 🏀 pic.twitter.com/grbyAYdT4P

— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) June 4, 2026

Cruz-Towns passed in April 2020 due to complications from COVID-19. Both she and Karl’s father, Karl Sr., tested positive for the virus. While Karl Sr.’s condition improved, Jacqueline’s worsened. She was in a medically induced coma and placed on a ventilator. After she suffered a stroke, Karl Sr. called his son, who made the heartbreaking decision to pull the plug.

“He was just like, ‘She’s gone. She had a stroke during the night, and she’s gone,'” Towns detailed in a 2020 video titled “The Toughest Year of My Life”. “I said, ‘Has she taken a step back? What’s the next step?’ Because in my mind, I’m just thinking about [next] steps…He had just told me that those doctors thought there was no way for meaningful life from her after this stroke.

“It just got to a point where it was harming her. I gave her all the time, and I made the hardest decision you can make. I called my sister, I told her what the decision I made was. You’ve got to live with that. I made that decision.”

Six years later, Towns is in the NBA Finals, playing for his hometown team, the New York Knicks. Last night, he led the Knicks back from a 14-point deficit to take Game 1 in San Antonio, outplaying Spurs superstar Victor Wembanyama. During that third-quarter run, Towns showcased all of his skills, scoring at the basket and beyond the arc and containing Wembanyama on the other end. With Towns guarding him, Wemby shot just 2-13 from the field, totaling nine points and five turnovers.

The excitement for the Knicks’ run has worked New York into a frenzy. The club hasn’t won an NBA title since 1973. Ticket prices for Games 3 and 4 at Madison Square Garden are through the roof. Even so, Towns said that pressure never reached his shoulders on Wednesday.

“All day, it was just a weird feeling. It felt like I was a kid getting ready to go play my Saturday AAU games and Sunday AAU games, and in a way, I felt like I was seeing her in the stands, and it was just fun. It was really fun. And it was really comforting because Game 1 of the NBA Finals, you’re told how the pressure’s going to be, and I don’t know. It felt like a certain presence was here that was very comforting and very loving, and I felt like I could have fun out here in Game 1 of the NBA Finals, which is the weirdest thing because you would expect to have the pressure at the highest.”

As if you needed another reason to root for Karl-Anthony Towns, right?