The news is by your side.

McClung impresses in dunk contest; Lillard wins the three-point contest

Sports
0

INDIANAPOLIS — The names on the trophies didn't change from year to year in the NBA's biggest games on All-Star Saturday Night.

Mac McClung, the G League journeyman who shocked the world with his victory in the Salt Lake City dunk contest last February, did it again in Indianapolis, beating Jaylen Brown with a final-round shot over 7-foot-1 Shaquille O'Neal. jumping for a perfect 50 from the judges.

And in the three-point match earlier, Damian Lillard hit the final moneyball on his final rack, edging Trae Young for his second straight win in the event.

The 25-year-old McClung, who has played in a total of four NBA games in his career, won a game with a second G Leaguer: Jacob Toppin, the brother of 2022 NBA dunk champion Obi Toppin. McClung, who also played over two people jumped for a dunk, and dropped the ball as he floated to the rim before catching it again and slamming it for another, putting his high school jersey on Shaq's massive frame, leaping over him and completing a reverse slam.

“Shaq was so cool putting on my high school jersey,” McClung said. “Man, it almost makes you emotional that he would do that. I told him, 'Well, put it on.' And he said, 'You better not miss a dunk.' I thought, 'Okay, I won't miss it.'”

The two current NBA players in the dunk contest didn't fare so well. Miami Heat rookie Jaime Jaquez Jr. was the first player ejected, while Brown, an All-Star for the Boston Celtics, was booed after almost every dunk, a clear sign from fans that they felt his scores were too high for the dunks he performed, especially in comparison with McClung.

Brown, the first All-Star to participate in the dunk contest in years, put “pressure” on McClung with his final dunk by putting a glove the size of Mickey Mouse on his left hand, then jumping and using it to knock a ball from someone's hand. to get my head around. gloved hand and immerse it.

“I think ultimately (in) this media age, some players are afraid to turn it into a meme or something like that,” Brown said. “Like I wanted to come out and have fun with it, and that's what I did.”

McClung, who now plays for the Orlando Magic's G League affiliate, is the first back-to-back dunk winner since Zach LaVine in 2015 and 2016. McClung, LaVine, Nate Robinson, Jason Richardson and Michael Jordan are the only players to win row. dunk contests.

“This is my story and I embrace it,” McClung said.

Lillard is the first back-to-back 3-point champion since Jason Kapono in 2007 and 2008, joining Kapono, Larry Bird, Craig Hodges, Mark Price, Jeff Hornacek and Peja Stojakovic as 3-point contest winners in consecutive years .

He defeated Young and 2022 NBA 3-point winner Karl-Anthony Towns in the finals, and also persevered in a four-way tiebreaker in which the three finalists and Indiana's Tyrese Haliburton had to shoot 30 seconds (normal rounds are 70 seconds). get out of the first round.

Towns came in first in the finals and shot a 22. Young beat him at 24, and Lillard was stuck at 24 on his final rack until that final shot.

“I knew as soon as I got to that three-point ball, the deep one, I could win it if I knocked it down and gave myself an advantage by going into my bonus rack right before that last ball,” Lillard said. “So I knew I had a good chance.

“When I got to the last rack I didn't know my exact score, but when I missed a few I just heard the crowd oohing and aahing. When they kept doing it over and over again, I knew I was still alive because I knew they would have stopped if it had been over for me. I missed the next two balls again, and then I took the next one and I knew I needed it to win.”

Sandwiched between the 3-point and dunk contests was the history shootout between Stephen Curry and WNBA star Sabrina Ionescu, won by Curry. The annual All-Star Saturday took place on a brand new, forgiving LED glass field, developed by German company ASB GlassFloor, and installed at the Lucas Oil football stadium for All-Star Weekend. The floor changed colors, images and messages throughout the night.

The Pacers trio of Haliburton, Myles Turner and Bennedict Mathurin – MVP of Friday night's Rising Stars Game – won the annual skills challenge, emerging victorious in individual rounds of an obstacle course, passing competition and shooting competition. Haliburton, who would later lose the tiebreaker to get into the final round of the 3-point competition, drained a half-court shot in a skills challenge tiebreaker to clinch it ahead of the Indiana Pacers.

“It's home cooking, if you hold it down,” Turner said.

Required reading

(Photo: Stacy Revere/Getty Images)

You might also like More from author

Leave A Reply

Your email address will not be published.