The NBA All-Star Game took place this past weekend at Chase Center in San Francisco under a brand new format.
The NBA has been trying to figure out a way to get players invested in the event again and this year’s twist was that members of TNT’s Inside The NBA – Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith – each picked a team for a mini tournament.
The league also ended up elevating a team composed of NBA rookies, sophomores and G League standouts from the Rising Star Challenge event they held a few days prior to make it a four-team tournament.
Instead of the typical 48-minute game, each game was a race to 40 points, and in the end, O’Neal’s Team OGs ended up winning the whole thing, defeating Barkley’s Global Stars 41-25 in the final.
Hometown superstar Steph Curry – who also helped to set up the new format – wound up winning his second Kobe Bryant Trophy as the All-Star Game MVP.
“I was just riding high on the energy this whole weekend because it’s here,’ Curry said to the media in San Francisco. “You want the product to be at a level that is fun for us as players and then you want to feel a little bit of energy from the crowd and everybody who’s watching on TV that’s tuning in for a reason. You want to give them a show. I kind of feel like that all the time, but I felt like it all mattered and everyone was professional tonight. Everyone did their job and did right by the game. It was a step in the right direction, I felt like.”
Joining Curry on Team OGs were former Duke standouts Jayson Tatum and Kyrie Irving, who replaced teammate Anthony Davis due to injury, along with Kevin Durant, LeBron James, Jaylen Brown, James Harden and Damien Lillard.
“It’s just a celebration of a lot of great things happening in basketball,” Curry said. “To be playing with these guys for as long as we have, it’s obviously our responsibility to come out and put on a show and I thank them for helping me do that. And then it being in Golden State. A lot of history has happened out here but the competition and the comradery and the legacy’s we’ve all created is what it’s all about. I’m happy to be a part of that celebration.”
However, not all players were happy with the new format. Fellow Golden State Warrior Draymond Green did not hold back, rating the new format as a 0/10 on the TNT broadcast.
“You work all year to be an All-Star and then you play up to 40 and you’re done,” Green said. “This sucks. It ain’t basketball.”
Green wasn’t alone in his thoughts either as other stars expressed frustrations with the format too, so perhaps we will once again be seeing yet another new format next year.
Beyond the game though, the All-Star Weekend also featured various skill competitions which took place on Saturday.
Winston-Salem native Chris Paul took part in the All-Star Skills Challenge the day before, teaming up with San Antonio Spurs teammate Victor Wembanyama.
Despite the pair concocting a hilarious strategy – tossing away all of their balls in the shooting portion of the relay to get the fastest possible time – the strategy wound up getting them disqualified.
“This has Chris Paul’s fingerprints all over it,” said broadcaster Kevin Harlan during the event.
“We tried a strategy that we thought could win,” Paul said to the media in San Francisco following the disqualification. “It was fun.”
“I don’t regret it,” Wembanyama echoed. “I think it was a good idea. … We had the best time, the numbers speak for themselves.”
The Cleveland Cavaliers’ tandem of Donovan Mitchell and Even Mobley ended up winning after the Spurs’ DQ.
Brooklyn Nets forward and former Tar Heel Cam Johnson took part in the 3-Point Contest but came up well short, tying Norman Powell of the Los Angeles Clippers for the lowest score in the event with just 14 points.
Johnson struggled to start, with just five points through his first three racks, but he went 7-for-10 in the final two from the right wing and corner to avoid finishing solely in last place.
Miami Heat sharpshooter Tyler Herro took home the win in the 3-Point Contest.
Perhaps the most looked forward to event though was the Slam Dunk Contest and G Leaguer Mac McClung wound up winning a third title as he jumped clear over a car for one of his four perfect scoring dunks.
The weekend also featured the Rising Stars Challenge on Friday and while there would have been a few familiar faces in it for North Carolinians – Duke graduates Jared McCain and Dereck Lively II as well as Charlotte Hornets Brandon Miller were all originally selected to take part in the event – injuries kept them all off the court.
