New York City is on fire right now.

To be clear, that fire is orange and blue.

For the first time in the 15 years that I’ve lived here, walking around the city feels like walking around a college campus. It feels like one out of every five people is wearing orange and blue for the New York Knicks, who haven’t made it to the NBA finals in 27 years.

On the Upper West Side, the black and white cookies at Fairway have turned orange and blue. The bagels at Kossar’s have done the same. Hundreds of pop-up game watch parties have sprung up all over the city, and the people are quite literally taking to the streets. It’s reminding me of the important role that fandom plays in our society.

Most communities today form around opposition. They’re built around what people dislike, what they’re resisting, or who they’re fighting against. But fandom works differently. Rather than forming around polarization, fandom invites people to direct their attention toward something they love.

As I watched the second Knicks game in the NBA finals at home with my husband (admittedly, the first Knicks game that I’d ever watched), it struck me at how much fun all the fans were having, for so much of the game. Because the game was anyone’s to win or lose, the crowd and the fans from both teams spent equal amounts of time on the brink of hope.

We have so much these days to make us sad, that it’s easy to forget how fun it is to be a fan, how nice it feels to have someone to root for (even if they lose).

Fans show up year after year. They celebrate the wins and endure the losses. They invest hope (even in outcomes they can’t control). And in doing so, they create something bigger than any competition: A sense of belonging and shared identity. That’s something I think we all could use a little more of these days.

Knicks fans aren’t the only ones with a big week in New York City. Last night was also the 79th annual Tony Awards, a celebration of the top theatrical performances of the year on Broadway.

Thanks to my husband’s role as a Broadway sound designer, I’ve been hanging around this industry long enough to see how these award shows go. Some years, the ones you’re rooting for take it all home. Other times, the chips don’t quite land in your favor.

Like a lot of things, the winners always make it feel like success was inevitable. But when you’re close enough to the fire, you hear more about the near-misses. The nominations that never quite convert into wins.

Whether you’re a sports fan or a theatre aficionado, it’s easy to get disheartened by these close calls. Just chalk it up to luck, bad calls, or a rigged system, and move on. But as it turns out, that doesn’t work, either.

What I like about the Tony Awards is that it’s a celebration of what’s new and novel in theatre today. The insiders watch for the “who’s-who” of category winners, but the majority watch for a chance to get a peek at the newest shows on stage without every having to buy a ticket.

Maybe that’s the real magic of all that extra attention.

Whether it’s a televised industry spectacle or a basketball team breaking a decades-long drought, when you drop the entry point to zero, these high-stakes competitions serve a much nobler purpose: To usher in new fans.

When I was younger, I used to think championships and awards existed primarily to determine who was the best. Now I’m not so sure.

The longer I spend around sports, theatre, technology, or really, any other competitive industry, the more I see wins and losses up close. As a founder, I win and lose deals every week. I’ve been nominated for awards that never materialized, and I’ve lucked into being in the right place at the right time for others. I've seen people get rich on a whim, and I've seen the transformative power of a single lottery-ticket exit.

A few observations:

• Some people leave the game as soon as they've won enough.

• Others leave after a painful loss.

• But then there are the ones who stick around, no matter what. (The true fans.)

What I notice about the ones who stay in the game the longest is that they aren’t playing to win. That is, not really. They play the game in order to stay in the game. Over time, they develop fan bases that like to play along, too.

Which brings us back to awards and competitions. If the point isn’t actually to quantifiably delineate “the best of the best,” maybe the real goal is something much more powerful: Competitions give people reason to care.

So, whether you win or lose, I hope at the very least that you get to experience it for yourself this week. And maybe in the weeks and months and years to come, too.

After all, it’s fun to be a fan. But it’s even better when you find something worth showing up for.