Kevin Durant scored 31 points to get the MVP title as Team LeBron came together from a 20-point deficit to clobber Team Giannis 178-164 in the 2019 NBA All-Star Game.
Durant, who also was MVP in 2012, got his team untracked in the second half in a game that, pundits said, almost looked like it’d be a trey-shooting bout.
Giannis Antetokounmpo, one of the two captains along with LeBron James, led all scorers with 38 points as his hand-picked squad scored a record-equaling 53 points in the first quarter and led 95-82 at halftime, said a Manila Times report, citing a dispatch from Agence France Presse (AFP).
“Previously, my first and second all-star, I think I was kind of nervous,” Antetokounmpo was quoted as saying.
“This one I was a little bit more relaxed. I had my name on that MVP until the third quarter, and they got hot and took it away from me.”
Defense crumbled especially in the first half, but the all-stars buckled down in front of a sold-out crowd of 19,000 at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte, North Carolina when showtime came at the fourth frame.
Team LeBron came back from a 20-point third quarter deficit via 20 points from Klay Thompson and 19 from Kawhi Leonard.
Team LeBron also set a record with a total of 91 three-point attempts. The teams combined for 81 three point attempts in the first half alone, said the AFP report.
“They were scoring too easy,” Team LeBron player Damian Lillard, who finished with 18 points, was also quoted as saying. “I know it is the All-Star Game but we had to make them work a bit more.
“In this kind of game you can erase those leads quick.”
