The 2023-2024 NBA All-Star Game, which took place at the Sono Arena in Goyang, South Korea, on Thursday, was one of the best festivals in basketball, with players and fans alike having a blast.
This year’s NBA All-Star Game attracted a lot of attention before the game due to the high interest of fans. Fans were so enthusiastic that all 5561 seats were sold out within three minutes of the ticket sales opening on the 8th.
In fact, fans were lined up inside the stadium two hours before tip-off. The game pitted Team KMB against Team GongAji. Heo-woong (KCC), the fan favorite, was the mainstay of Team Kvlmong, while Team Gongazi was scheduled to be led by Heo-hoon (KT), the fan favorite, but he was unable to participate due to injury.
The players were excited to be in front of so many fans at the stadium. The day before, the players had invited 120 fans to a large cafe in Goyang City for a coffee break, where they played various games, talk shows, and photo sessions to strengthen their friendship, and they also had a great time interacting with the fans through various events whenever they had a break, such as during game time.
The highlight of the day was the third quarter, when Team Kvlmont coach Kim Joo-sung and Team GongAji coach Cho Sang-hyun played in uniform.
Kim, one of the best big men in professional basketball during his career, was matched up against Kim Jong-kyu of the same team, while Cho faced the tight defense of Lee Kwan-hee of the same team.
In particular, Kim showed off his rusty skills by hitting two three-pointers and playing fantastic defense against Kim Jong-kyu’s passes from behind the arc.
The three-point shooting contest and dunk contest, which are the core events of the All-Star Game, saw mixed performances from domestic and foreign players.
In the three-point shooting contest, where only four players made it to the finals after qualifying, Lee Geun-hwi, whose talent was praised by KCC coach Jeon Chang-jin, who said, “If you shoot 10 in training, 11 will go in,” won. After scoring 22 points in the preliminary round, Lee scored a whopping 27 points in the final round to take first place overall, beating Andrew Nicholson (KCC-21 points) by a wide margin.
In the dunk contest, Justin Gutang (LG) and Paris Bass (KT), who both qualified and made it to the finals, battled it out, with Bass coming out on top.
The finals consisted of one or two rounds with the highest score winning, and while Bass only scored 45 points in the first round, she turned things up a notch in the second round with a between-the-legs dunk, which involves catching the ball in midair and dunking it between her legs. He followed it up with a 360-degree spin and a between-the-legs dunk to turn the tide, earning a perfect 50 points. Gutang also performed a tricky dunk, but scored 49 points in rounds one and two to give Bath the win.
The game ended in a 135-128 victory for Team Gong’azi, the third-longest overtime game in All-Star Game history and the first in 22 years since the 2001-2002 season. Leading by as many as 20 points at one point and looking to be on their way to an easy victory, Team Gong’a rallied in the third quarter, led by Huang (34 points, six 3-pointers) and Dedrick Lawson (32 points, 15 rebounds), to send the game into overtime, but it was Jamil Warne’s (51 points, 14 rebounds) tremendous performance in the extra session that secured the win. Warney was named Most Valuable Player (MVP) by the media.