I first became aware of the New York Knicks when I was in Sri Lanka. At a hostel I was looking for something to kill time, and found a bookshelf where guests would exchange books – they’d take one and leave one of their own. From that bookshelf I took a book I will probably keep forever.

It was written by Spike Lee, and it was a sort of amalgamation of an autobiography and an account of Knicks history – a ‘basketball life’ of someone who didn’t ever play basketball. I didn’t know when I picked up the book, but I’ve since learned that he is part of the furniture in New York sporting circles. The book chronicles his love for the Knicks as a youngster, who was in his formative years when they won titles in the early 70s. The book was full of history, of great periods in the 1970s and 1990s. For a British sports fan who had yet to take more than a passing interest in any of the big four US sports, it was a good read, but not much more. I did however adopt the Knicks as my NBA team, despite the interest being extremely casual.

That was in early 2014. Two and a half years later I was in New York en route to studying abroad, and the Knicks re-entered my consciousness. That team is everywhere – the Yankees may be more famous and more successful, but by all accounts New York is a basketball city. I bought merchandise, I took a trip to Madison Square Garden (I was unable to catch a game) and promised to pay attention for the season ahead. I started to learn about the team – I knew Carmelo Anthony, but also got to know the defining characteristics of Kristaps Porzingis and Derrick Rose. On the way home from my trip, four months later, I saw the Knicks lose in Denver. Losing was something I got used to pretty quickly.

It was the perfect transition – having read Lee’s book I was aware of the culture, the history, what it means to play at the Garden. Reed’s hobble, Ewing’s envelope, Starks’ misses, Reggie Miller’s mocking choke. I knew in theory what it meant to be a Knicks fan before I’d watched a game. I knew we hadn’t won a title in over four decades. I knew about the near misses. I knew about the impatience, the aversion to building a team the right way. I knew about the star players who had had money thrown at them and then had crumbled under the spotlights of the most famous arena in the world – the Mecca of basketball.

My interest grew more and more – for half a season on my return the Knicks struggled for relevance, missed the playoffs, and blew it all up. Anthony was traded, and the team was to be built around Porzingis. There was a brief flurry of relevance the next year, before the big Latvian tore his ACL. The Knicks played the kids, and stopped being competitive.

That was all run of the mill, and over that time I had become progressively more knowledgeable about the team. The next offseason, the Knicks decided to build a more organic team – young, hungry free agents and draft picks who would play out of their skin, and as more than the sum of their parts. They wouldn’t win, but it wouldn’t be for want of trying. They’d develop, and the future would be bright. In the first game of the year, undrafted underdog Allonzo Trier threw down a vicious dunk on the Atlanta Hawks, setting the tone. Mitchell Robinson, a flier in the second round of the draft, defied all expectations and was recognised in an all-rookie team – one of the ten best first year players in the league.

A plan emerged – the Knicks would lose, again, while the youngsters got game time together and improved. The NBA’s draft system would reward them, hopefully with the chance to pick Zion Williamson, whose physical traits are as biblical as his name. Kevin Durant, the second-best player in the world, wanted out of title-winning juggernaut that was the Warriors. He wanted to swap the Bay Area for New York, to lionize himself by bring a championship to a city that has been without for 46 years. His friend Kyrie Irving, who grew up a short hop away across the Hudson River in New Jersey, wanted to come with him. Those three would make the Knicks great again, to coin a phrase.

Here we get to the crux – as a football fan who loves my team from the same time zone (although admittedly from some distance away), I’d never been able to understand how fans from abroad, typically fans of Premier League teams from America, Africa or the subcontinent, could claim to ‘love’ a team. You watch them win or lose on a television, and that’s it. I guess it makes a difference if you support a typical loser, but it’s not the same. I know from going to watch Wolves that the emotions of a match day are such a huge part of the experience.

I think, after this offseason, that I get it now. It’s not quite the same, it can’t ever be. It will take something special for me to be on the same level of someone who goes to the Garden even once a season. I’m no longer a student, so I can’t stay up until the small hours to watch games. When major events happen, I find the news when I wake up. I’ve followed a similar timeline of attention to my best friend who supports the hated-76ers. I’m terrible at hiding how jealous I am of their progress, but it won’t turn my head. For better or worse, and even worse than that, I’m in this for the long haul.

That experience has been roundly negative for me this season in the same way – the draft lottery snatched Zion away. Durant and Irving did decide to go to New York – but to the Nets in Brooklyn, a team who has been in their cavernous, Mary Celeste of an arena since 2008.

That the grand plan fell apart actually made me realise I love the Knicks. I’m not about supporting a team that wins any more, although that would be nice. I’m fiercely proud of the players, a group of young, hungry guys with chips on their shoulder. The new front office team added free agents who aren’t big names but will battle and play tough. It’s not the glitz and glamour you might associate with a building in Manhattan, less than ten blocks from Time Square. It is, however, a team built to grow and to take the fans with it. Struck a body blow by the humiliation of being overlooked for the team’s little brother in Brooklyn, players like Robinson, Trier, Kevin Knox and RJ Barrett will need to grit their teeth get up off the canvas yet again and battle for the Knicks’ future. I feel like I know enough about the heart and soul of the ‘franchise’ now to say that I’ll be there the whole way.