by Kareem Dobson
Thursday, Feb. 12, stars from the National Basketball Association and all over the U.S. will descend on Manhattan for the 2015 All-Star Weekend Events. Starting with an all-day dunk-a-thon, the weekend will be reportedly the biggest weekend in basketball besides the 2015 NBA playoffs.
The four major parts of the All Star weekend are the All-Star Celebrity Game which includes stars such as Nick Cannon, Skylar Diggins and Kevin Hart in the past years. The celebrity game is one of the most popular among the college kids because they get to see the people they idolize have fun and do something that connects them to one another.
The next event is the All Star Rising Stars Challenge which takes some rookies and sophomores in the league such as Trey Burke, Zach LaVine, Steven Adams and Dante Exum and puts them up against each other in a battle to see who is the best rising star in the NBA. This year the NBA is trying something new with the Rising Star Challenge and it will be a USA vs. World format, which pits rookies and sophomores from the United States against rookies and sophomores from around the world.
The third event is the Sprite Slam Dunk Contest pitting the four highest flying, spinning and flexible members against each other to do their best tricks in a fight to win the title. The four contestants are Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milwaukee Bucks), Zach LaVine (Minnesota Timberwolves), Victor Oladipo (Orlando Magic) and Mason Plumlee (Brooklyn Nets).
The final event of the weekend is the actual All-Star Game. The game will be held at Madison Square Garden, which is known as the mecca of basketball. The All-Star game will pit the best players in both the Eastern and Western conference against each other. This is the 64th NBA All-Star Game and the game will be seen by fans in 215 countries and heard in 47 languages.
Spartan Echo 