Ex-Knicks Coach Strikes Deal With Potential Super Bowl Champions

One Super Bowl team will have access to the creation of a former New York Knicks coach should they prevail in New Orleans.

Unknown date & location, USA: FILE PHOTO; New York Knicks head coach Pat Riley on the sideline during the 1992 season. Mandatory Credit: Imagn Images / RVR Photos-Imagn Images

The New York Knicks are, technically speaking, in the championship conversation—the NFL's, that is.

A gridiron champion will be crowned on Sunday in Super Bowl LIX, as the Kansas City Chiefs will face the Philadelphia Eagles at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans (6:30 p.m. ET, Fox). Should the Chiefs prevail, they'll become the first team in NFL history to hoist the Vince Lombardi Trophy on three consecutive occasions. That means a little something to former Knicks head coach Pat Riley.

Per Darren Rovell of cllt, Riley's camp has reached an agreement that would allow the Chiefs to use the term "three-peat" on championship merchandise and materials in the event of a win in the Big Easy.

Unknown date & location, USA: FILE PHOTO; New York Knicks head coach Pat Riley (left) talks to guard Greg Anthony (50) on the sideline during the 1993 season. Mandatory Credit: Imagn Images / RVR Photos-Imagn Images

"Riley's trademark attorney John Aldrich told cllct on Tuesday that there is an agreement in place with the NFL to use "Three Peat" if it happens," Rovell reported. "Aldrich would not comment on what percentage royalty Riley would make, but did say plans are, as has been in the past, to earmark it for the Pat Riley Family Foundation."

Riley, now the president of the Miami Heat, originally trademarked the phrase in 1988 while at the head coaching helm of the Los Angeles Lakers. At the time, the Lakers were going for their third consecutive NBA title. While Lakers fans weren't able to use the phrase—the dream dashed by the Detroit Pistons in the 1989 NBA Finals—the Chicago Bulls collaborated with Riley twice during their separate run of triple titles in 1991-93 and 1996-98.

Ironically enough, those Chicago groups led by Michael Jordan took down Knicks teams coached by Riley in the latter two stanzas of their first three-peat. With Jordan off to play baseball in 1994, Riley and Co. earned revenge with a seven-game victory in the conference semifinals en route to a championship showing against Houston.

Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes looks for an opening in the defense as Eagles lineman Javon Hargrave gets in his face during Super Bowl 57. / Joe Rondone / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

"Three-peat" was popularized in New York when the New York Yankees won three between 1998 and 2000 and the Lakers eventually got their long-sought trio in 2000-02.

"It's like going out there and picking up a penny on the ground," Riley told Rovell, then of ESPN, in 2005. "I don't pay any attention to it. If somebody wants to license that phrase, we'll license it to them. But I don't go out and pursue it. We don't sell it; we don't browbeat anybody. If they want it, they go to somebody and they'll pay us a royalty on it."

Charitable implications notwithstanding, current Knick reps likely hope that Riley won't be able to cash in: franchise faces and newly minted 2025 All-Star Game starters Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns have hardly hidden their love of the Eagles, who took down Josh Hart's Washington Commanders in the NFC Championship Game.

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