NBA All-Star Game live updates: Weekend highlights, game time, formats and team rosters

New York Times

16-02-2025

Check out the highlights from Saturday night, including Mac McClung jumping over a Kia and scoring a 50 on all of his dunks to win his third straight Dunk Contest. Thearon W. Henderson / Getty Images
SAN FRANCISCO — He may still not be a household name, nor is he really an NBA player, but Mac McClung can now say he is the greatest dunk champion in league history.
McClung, 26, who plays for the Osceola Magic in the NBA G League and played in just one game for the Orlando Magic this season, became the first player in dunk contest history to win the event three years in a row — pulling off a perfect score of 200 with four dunks not quite seen before and beat San Antonio rookie Stephon Castle in an entertaining final round to finish off All-Star Saturday night at the Chase Center.
Tyler Hero, a first-time All-Star who is currently tied for fourth in 3s this season, unseated Damian Lillard as 3-point champion by narrowly escaping round one (by one point, over Lillard) and then finishing with a final-round tally of 24 points — beating hometown favorite Buddy Hield, of the Warriors, by a point.
The Cavaliers' duo of Donovan Mitchell and Mobley, both All-Stars, won the annual skills challenge, emerging victorious in individual rounds of an obstacle course, passing contest and shooting competition over the host-Warriors' Draymond Green and Moses Moody.
GO FURTHER
Mac McClung flashes perfect score, pulling off historic third straight NBA dunk contest win
On Halloween night in 2007, a 19-year-old rookie from the District of Columbia took a bounce pass in transition. Kevin Durant dribbled once and pushed off his left leg toward the rim. The shot didn't fall but Durant was fouled.
Durant missed the first free throw, but he made the second. 'And there, his first NBA point is scored at the line,' broadcaster Mike Tirico told an ESPN audience. 'I think there will be a few more after that.'
A few more and then some. Over the next 17-plus years, Durant established himself as an elite scorer, collecting one milestone after another. On Tuesday night against the Memphis Grizzlies, he passed 30,000 career points with two free throws late in the third quarter, sacred ground that only seven other NBA players have reached.
'There's what, there's 5,000 billionaires in the world?' said Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo, perhaps a bit high in his estimate. 'This is a more exclusive club.'
Wilt Chamberlain was the first member, scoring his 30,000th point when Phoenix Suns big man Neal Walk goal-tended a shot near the rim in 1972. ('Is that some way to get to 30,000 points?' legendary Lakers broadcaster Chick Hearn said that night.) Since then, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dirk Nowitzki and LeBron James have followed. Julius Erving also scored 30,000 points, but 11,662 came in the ABA.
'I've always been inspired by the greats,' Durant said after the Phoenix Suns' 119-112 loss to Memphis. 'I wanted to reach their level. … I've been inspired by those guys, and to be in their company is just surreal.
'I just want to do things the right way,' he said. 'I want to come to work every day, put my best foot forward. … I've accumulated some accolades, but for the most part, I just try to maximize myself every day.'
Read more on Durant's path to 30,000 points here.
GO FURTHER
Kevin Durant and the march toward 30,000 points: 'Consistency of greatness'
The LA Clippers weren't going to have an All-Star starter. But the question was whether point guard James Harden or one of his teammates, such as shooting guard Norman Powell or center Ivica Zubac, would represent the team in San Francisco with Kawhi Leonard missing the start of the season.
'Somebody's got to make it,' Harden said after his third 40-point game of the season in a win over the Milwaukee Bucks last month. 'We've put the work in. We put ourselves in a really good position.'
The NBA head coaches selected Harden as an All-Star reserve. He earned his 11th selection and his first since a 10-year streak was snapped in 2023. Harden is the 16th All-Star in franchise history — and the oldest at 35.
'For James, it's a great individual award just to be an All-Star,' Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. 'It's only 24 players selected out of 450 players. He's been at the elite level before. It's good to see him get back there. People recognize how much he means to a team and what he does.'
Read more on a resurgent season from Harden here.
GO FURTHER
How James Harden's leadership surprised the Clippers and made him an All-Star again
The pressures that come with being the No. 1 pick can be as heavy. The fan base expects that player to be a savior. The franchise decision-makers do, too. The suits go to sleep wishing, hoping, perhaps even praying that their decision to select a player with the honor of the No. 1 pick can lead to grander things.
But for every LeBron James, there's a Michael Olowokandi. For every Shaquille O'Neal, there's a Kwame Brown. The hype doesn't always match what ends up happening.
Somewhere between each end of the spectrum is Karl-Anthony Towns, who has long been considered one of the best offensive talents in the game since his arrival a decade ago. There's a trophy room full of individual accolades, though the team ones aren't there yet. Towns didn't quite alter the fortunes of the Minnesota Timberwolves, the team that took him No. 1 in 2015, but he eventually helped get them somewhere they hadn't been in 20 years, all while being among the league's best offensive players.
Towns, now a member of the New York Knicks, was recently named an All-Star for the fifth time in his career. By the season's end, he'll likely be a three-time All-NBA player. He's on a short list of legitimate MVP candidates. More importantly, Towns is in a situation where the team success that has evaded him to this point in his career is obtainable. The Knicks are third in the Eastern Conference and in the midst of a season New York City hasn't witnessed in quite some time.
Read more on a career year for KAT here.
GO FURTHER
The gravity of Karl-Anthony Towns: How he became the best version of himself with Knicks
Mac McClung's performance was so electric tonight that he has NBA stars like Ja Morant and Giannis Antetokounmpo thinking about getting involved in the Dunk Contest next year.
Mac McClung is not the first person to earn four straight 50s in a dunk contest. Zach LaVine did it in 2015, and Aaron Gordon actually had five straight 50s in 2020 before losing controversially to Derrick Jones Jr. in a dunk-off.
Still, four straight 50s is no small feat. Watch all four of them below.
Mac McClung had previously indicated this will likely be his last dunk contest, but he at least left the door open when asked directly by TNT's Allie LaForce. Four-peat in 2026?
Tonight illustrates why I keep coming back to the Dunk Contest even as it seems to perpetually teeter on the edge of irrelevancy. Nobody was excited about this field, yet it produced a one-on-one duel that was at least in the same ballpark as Aaron Gordon-Zach LaVine. (And by the way: Few expected Gordon-LaVine to be as incredible as it ended up being). Stephon Castle was a worthy adversary and Mac McClung had to earn his victory.
I understand why there are so many calls for the big names to sign up. We have been deprived some of the best athletes in the sport. But dunking is a different skill altogether, and you never know who will thrive on the open stage. Give me a big name, a couple up-and-comers and a guy like McClung, and I'm happy.
We got two of three this time, at least.
Stephon Castle had a very DeMar DeRozan in 2011 performance. Excellent dunker but didn't have the theatricality. I imagine Castle will have similar feelings about props after this one.
How many letters in Mac? Three.🏆🏆🏆
Mac McClung is the first three-peat NBA Dunk Contest champ.
Trivia question: How many times did Mac McClung score below a 50 in the NBA Slam Dunk Contest?
Mac is the deserved winner, but I'm over pushing off of a person holding the ball to get extra height. He does sick stuff after he pushes off, but he's pushing off three years in a row. Up the money and get the stars out there. Or maybe they're just scared of Mac?
Jesse D. Garrabrant / NBAE via Getty Images
Mac McClung is the king of adding extra movements before he dunks, and also making sure everyone sees what he's doing. Imagine if Gerald Green had that clarity back when he did the cupcake dunk!
You gotta give it to Mac McClung. He brought it tonight. One of the best performances ever.
To tap it on the front of the rim at that speed and do it softly enough to not lose control of the ball is totally insane. Legendary stuff from Mac McClung today.
Evan Mobley is a prop, and Mobley is standing on a block. Mac McClung leaps Mobley, grabs the rock, makes the ball and the rim kiss, then delivers the dunk.
Good night, everyone. McClung has defeated Stephon Castle.
Stephon Castle may go down as the most underappreciated dunk contest runner-up. Sometimes, it really is about adding charisma to the athleticism. If he hyped that crowd, would results be different?
Stephon Castle made that look too easy, and it's a sweet throwback to what Andre Iguodala and JR Smith have done in the past. That's nasty, but the crowd is with Mac McClung and his prop dunks.
Kenny Smith on national TV on Mac McClung's dunk: "That might be the second-best dunk I've ever seen." That is some high praise. Here it is.
As someone who has never dunked — is it harder to dunk off a make than a miss? I wonder what the version of that Stephon Castle dunk looks like if it clanks off the front rim.