Durant gets bragging rights with All-Star Game victory
Team LeBron, which included the Warriors’ Kevin Durant, rallies for a 3-point win over Team Stephen.
LOS ANGELES — With his team nursing a two-point lead at the start of the third quarter Sunday night, Stephen Curry took his seat on the bench, grabbed a box of popcorn and munched his favorite snack.
A short clip of the scene rippled through the blogosphere, prompting many to poke fun at the no-stakes nature of the All-Star Game. A year after one of the sloppiest showcases in recent memory, however, Curry and his fellow All-Stars showed that this exhibition can be about more than matador defense and acrobatic dunks.
In the debut of a format in which the player from each conference who received the most fan votes — Curry and LeBron James — chose rosters from a pool of players voted as starters and reserves, Team LeBron made several stops down the stretch to escape with a 148-145 win over Team Stephen. It was significant progress for a league that had grown wary of an All-Star Game void of competition.
“It was a very competitive game,” Curry said. “I think we did it the right way, showcased our talents and our skills, and put on a show. So, that was fun.”
A year after minimal defense was played in the Western Con-
ference’s 192-182 win in New Orleans, the NBA’s latest crop of All-Stars appeared intent on not making a mockery of the showcase. There were 11 lead changes and five ties. Though both teams still delivered plenty of “SportsCenter”-worthy highlights, they combined to shoot merely 47.9 percent from the field, including 29.3 percent from three-point range.
Team James overcame a 13point deficit to tie the game on a James three-pointer with 90 seconds left. After DeMar DeRozan made one of two freethrow tries with 40.2 seconds remaining to give Team Stephen a 145-144 lead, James scored on the ensuing possession.
Russell Westbrook made a layup to give Team LeBron a 148-145 lead with 10 seconds left, setting up a defensive stand that came to encapsulate how far this game has come. James and Kevin Durant blanketed Curry, forcing him into the corner and preventing a game-tying threepointer from being hoisted.
“Our coaches did a good job of sending a message yesterday in practice on how we wanted to play,” said Durant, who scored 19 points on a night he got bragging rights over Golden State teammates Curry (11 points on 4-for-14 shooting), Draymond Green (three points, five rebounds) and Klay Thompson (15 points). “We wanted to kind of change the narrative of the AllStar Game being a joke. Today, we wanted to make it a real basketball game.”
In recent years, as more AllStar Games passed with minimal defense or competition, the calls for change amplified. To add a measure of intrigue to a stale event, the league introduced its pickup-style format.
Perhaps the most entertaining part, the draft, was done on a conference call and not televised, to avoid embarrassing the last players selected. James took Durant first, which paved the way for one of the game’s more compelling subplots: watching Durant face three of his Golden State teammates.
The hope was that, by sharing squads with players with whom they might not get the chance to play again, the All-Stars would be more apt to ratchet up the intensity. It took a while, however, for NBA fans to see more competitive basketball.
Both teams played porous defense early and watched, mouths agape, as their famous counterparts strode through wide-open lanes for dunks. A celebrity-dotted Staples Center crowd was eerily quiet much of the night.
Midway through the second quarter, when Westbrook found James for a reverse alley-oop dunk, cheers were barely audible. The biggest applause came with 2:14 left, when Michael Jordan — owner of the Charlotte Hornets, hosts to the 2019 AllStar Game — was recognized at midcourt.
As the game progressed, players got more serious, arguing with referees and encouraging teammates. At one point in the third quarter, Green ran backward to swat a Kyrie Irving layup attempt. Sunday was far from a playoff-caliber effort, sure, but it was a notable stride forward from last year’s AllStar Game in which the two teams shot 58 and 56 percent, respectively.
“The hope is that it’s only going to get better,” Irving said. “This was pretty fun. I think we showcased that tonight with an incredible competitive spirit.”