He has some help getting to his seat, the walker a concession to his 88 years watching the games. But when the player introductions begin at Madison Square Garden and public address announcer Mike Walczewski gets to the final starter, Jalen Brunson — barely audible over the ovation — Zev Rose rises to his feet just like the rest of the 19,812 in attendance.

“I have a balance problem, but I get there,” he told Newsday. "I get to my seat with no trouble, and I can stand up for the national anthem and stand up when they introduce Jalen.”

As much as the fans have enjoyed watching   the Knicks push their way into the NBA Finals for the first time in 27 years, Zev Rose has maybe felt it a little more deeply. He is the father of Knicks president Leon Rose, the one who steered the younger Rose from coaching aspirations about 40 years ago to a path that led him here. And now he is able to sit just a few spots away from the Knicks executives and see the joy — and tears — that have accompanied these wins.

When the Knicks completed their conference semifinals sweep in Cleveland on Monday night, Zev wasn’t there, but he saw what went viral on social media — Leon Rose standing with his son, Sam Rose, and appearing to tear up as the final seconds ticked off the clock.

“I never could have envisioned this,” the elder Rose said. “This is being on top of the basketball world, and let me tell you something, basketball has been part of his life, our life, his whole life, and it really has been wonderful for us, but it's even more wonderful for him. And when he had tears in his eyes, when they showed that, believe me, I did, too.”

The elder Rose said he attends about 95% of the Knicks' home games, has been to every home playoff game and is plotting out travel to get to some of the NBA Finals road games. It’s Madison Square Garden now where he cheers, usually with an unlit cigar in one hand — a sort of throwback to the coaches he saw when he first began following the game, long before he imagined he’d be watching his family help guide this journey.

He had a law practice, and while Leon Rose was playing point guard for Cherry Hill East High School in South Jersey, not far from Philadelphia, Zev Rose may have been cheering just as loudly. It hasn’t stopped.

“There are no words that can explain or that can describe how incredible it is,” he said. “Look, we've gone through a lot. I've been there when Leon played basketball in high school for four years. He made the JV first year and then varsity his second year. I probably went to every one of his games. He had an incredible experience there. He's in the hall of fame there.

“And it's gotten better and better as the years have gone on, and we've been together the whole time. But this, this is unbelievable. This is something that I hate to say, it may be the best. It probably is the best. And it's a kid from Cherry Hill, you know, a kid born in Camden and raised in Cherry Hill, to be in this position in life is, is, is really unbelievable.”

While much of the fan base may feel connected now, celebrating the wins together at the Garden, in the streets of New York City and seemingly everywhere the team travels, the connections for the Rose family run deep.

It’s not just Leon Rose as team president but his son, Sam, who is an agent for CAA. His clients include Brunson and OG Anunoby. Leon Rose, as has been his style, would not speak publicly for this story, and he understandably is busy. But Zev Rose is happy to recount the story of how this began and how they all wound up here, how Leon went from player to coach to lawyer to agent to the executive who finally oversaw a renaissance at the Garden.

“He came to me when he was a senior, I guess, in college,” the elder Rose said. “He said he wants to be a coach, and I said, ‘Great, be a coach. But at least get a law degree and you have something to fall back on.’ ”

The younger Rose got the law degree and had practiced law for more than a decade when he got involved in some sports litigation, leading to taking on his first client as an agent — Rick Brunson, then a star coming out of Temple University. Rose helped him while Brunson played overseas, then in the Continental Basketball Association, and then negotiated nine one-year contracts for him as Brunson endured the journeyman career on the fringes of NBA rosters.

While that led to more clients, bigger clients, a practice that eventually was bought out by CAA with Rose serving as the head of basketball operations, it was the start that led them all here.

“It’s wonderful now,” Zev Rose said. “To be at games and there’s Leon and [his wife] Donna, Sam and [Leon’s daughter] Brooke, Rick and Jalen, Sandra Brunson. It’s family, and there is nothing bigger than family.”

There was a time two years ago when the elder Rose was hospitalized and Leon left the team to be with him. After surgery, Zev Rose  was in a rehabilitation facility in Florida working to recover, and he had a demand for the physicians.

“Thank God it all worked out,” he said. “They said that a good part of the time I was in the hospital, I was out of it. I didn’t know what was going on. Leon was there the whole time, watching over me. He got me some great help down there and it all worked out beautifully.

“But I watched the games. I was in the rehab for about six weeks in Florida and I told the doctors, ‘You’ve got to get me out of here so I can go to the playoffs.' I said, 'You have a big responsibility to get me well quicker.' ”

With the Knicks heading for a first-round matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers, the team the family had grown up rooting for, the Knicks not only won but the doctors did their part.

“Absolutely, I got to the whole playoffs,” he said, laughing. “They committed to their responsibility.”

It has gotten better since then, both for the family and for the Knicks. The team reached the Eastern Conference Finals last season, and now the team that Leon built has run off a historic stretch of one-sided victories, winning 11 straight playoff games to reach the NBA Finals.

“it's unbelievable what they have done, what the guys have done, what has gone on in the past 11 games,” Zev Rose said. “I saw Atlanta and thought they were really pretty good. I said once we beat them, hopefully it's uphill from now on. It has been more than uphill. It’s been up a mountain. They've climbed that mountain and done so well. It's just hard, so hard to believe.

“You don't know how many times I told him, ‘What a team!’ What he's done, really. He’s a pretty humble guy, and I tell him that it's just beautiful. This was before, of course, we got to where we are now. Maybe it proves I was right.”

By Steve Popper

steve.popper@newsday.com@StevePopper

Steve Popper covers the Knicks for Newsday. He has spent nearly three decades covering the Knicks and the NBA, along with just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.