NBA All-Star game, OKC Thunder update

Dean Blevins, John Holcomb and Toby Rowland break down the NBA All-Star game, while Thunder reporter Steve McGehee gives an update about the Oklahoma City Thunder.

The final pregame introduction belonged to none other than Stephen Curry. The big MVP trophy at the end, Curry heaved that up into the air, too, in a fitting finish to his All-Star Game at home.

His arena. His fans. His shining moment — the latest one on the list, that is.

Curry earned all this well-deserved fanfare in what has been a remarkable run from Oakland to San Francisco for the Golden State Warriors star.

“This is just a special weekend all the way around,” Curry said. “This is very symbolic of the entire journey. I hope we have a lot to accomplish on the court, not ending the journey any time soon. But again for me and from my vantage point having played here for 16 years and this is the only place that I’ve played, it’s just a great celebration of basketball in this area.”

Curry scored the first points of the final on a 3-pointer and later connected from half-court, running down the other way to chest-bump rapper Mistah Fab along one baseline. He helped Shaq’s OGs beat Chuck’s Global Stars 41-25 on Sunday, scoring 12 points on four 3s.

Fans at Chase Center chanted “MVP! MVP!” as he received the trophy.

An Olympic gold medal in August, then an All-Star victory back in the Bay Area six months later. Next month, he will celebrate his 37th birthday.

Curry took a moment during a break midgame, grabbed the mic and shared how “blessed” he felt having the All-Star Game on his court at 5-year-old Chase Center — something the Warriors had long envisioned.

Curry kicked a ball to Anthony Edwards before beginning his pregame shooting routine — minus his regular passing man, Warriors assistant coach Bruce Fraser.

Shaquille O’Neal drafted Curry and his teammates for the All-Star competition, and they faced Candace’s Rising Stars in the first game of the new format for the NBA’s midseason classic.

No quarters, no clock, first one to 40 points.

This was a fitting finish for Curry after a jam-packed weekend of parties, practice and community outreach.

“The hosting experience was unbelievable. I’m not going to complain about the entire exhaustiveness, it’s an honor and a blessing to be able to celebrate and share this beautiful Bay Area that’s been a part of my life for the last 16 years and the basketball history and culture that’s here, the amazing fans that are here,” Curry said, “the impact that the game being here has had on both cities, it was awesome from start to finish.”

It was Curry’s 11th All-Star selection and 10th appearance overall.

This basketball focus in the Bay Area clearly meant so much to Curry. He appeared emotional during the Canadian and U.S. national anthems and then quickly turned his attention to the next task.

It was about much more than just the game this weekend.

“It brought a lot of my people together that have helped me along the way or have been a part of the journey and I got to kind of reflect a little bit,” Curry said. “And I’m excited to get back to work next week. I’ll definitely get away and take a little catch up on some sleep.

“But everything kind of went exactly as it should.”

The verdicts were mixed, as would be expected.

The NBA’s All-Star Game mini-tournament is now complete, Shaq’s OGs getting the win in the four-team, three-game event where the first squad to score 40 points in each game got the victory.

Some players liked it. Some didn’t. Some seemed ambivalent. It was entertaining and had moments where things turned competitive, though tended to lean toward more of the same highlight-reel-type play that has been the norm in All-Star Games for years.

“I think it was a good step in the right direction to reinvigorate the game in some way,” All-Star MVP Stephen Curry of the host Golden State Warriors said. “And then you tinker with it again next year and see what changes you can make. I don’t want to compare it to any other era because the world has changed, life is different, the way people consume basketball is different. So, it’s not going to look like it used to. But it still can be fun for everybody.”

The league went to the tournament after years of asking players to take the All-Star Game more seriously. Last year’s 211-186 game in Indianapolis was the last straw for the league, and the tournament began taking shape.

There were some numbers suggesting a bit more defense was played last year. The 2024 All-Star Game saw the teams shoot 56% from the field, compared to 50% this year. And there were three blocked shots, total, in last year’s 48-minute game; this year’s game had three blocks in the first three minutes of the first semifinal.

“I think it’s interesting. It’s different,” New York’s Jalen Brunson said after his team — Kenny’s Young Stars — lost in the semifinal round. “The games are kind of short. I like the format. It’s something new, something unique. Maybe score to 50, maybe. But it’s interesting, something new like that. You never really know what to expect, but it was all right.”

The entire idea has been met with skepticism from the outset, first for the notion of turning the game into a tournament with eight-man roster and then for the additional detail of having 24 All-Stars, as usual, but adding the Rising Stars event winner — a team with no All-Stars, at least not any selected by fans, media or coaches — into the competition.

Boston’s Jayson Tatum, who scored 15 points to help Shaq’s OGs in the final, said he wasn’t sure about whether the Rising Stars should have been part of the event.

“Obviously happy for those guys,” Tatum said. “But there is something to be said, it’s kind of a big deal to be an All-Star and play Sunday night. Some guys get snubbed and other guys have to work really, really hard to make the All-Star Game. Playing on Sunday night is special, and it always has been. I’m not saying that that was the right or wrong decision.

“Trial run, I guess,” he added. “They’ll continue to make tweaks or whatever.”

It was unusual, for certain. Miami guard Tyler Herro, the league’s new 3-point shootout champion, played eight minutes in his All-Star debut. He didn’t even need a towel when he left the floor for the night.

“It was a short, quick burst, honestly,” Herro said. “Broke like not even a half-sweat.”

The Los Angeles Lakers’ LeBron James and Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards couldn’t play because of injuries. James said before the games that he was curious about how it would all turn out. Edwards didn’t seem to care for the whole notion. Basically, if he’s going to play hard, he’s going to do it with something at stake.

“I’ve never been an All-Star Game type of guy, to like take it serious and go out there and try to guard somebody and get a stop,” Edwards said. “I’ve never been that type of guy. I just save it for the Timberwolves season, pretty much.”

San Antonio’s Victor Wembanyama made his stance clear for the past couple of weeks after getting picked. He was going to play hard, and did — even trying to lock down Kyrie Irving, one of the game’s premier ballhandlers, out on the wing during one possession in the final.

“It felt like there were high stakes in the game,” Wembanyama said. “It was better than expected. I think the format worked really well.”

And social media didn’t seem to care for how the title game was stopped to pay tribute to TNT and its four decades of NBA broadcasting, with some saying they would have preferred that portion take place between games.

The game stopped with the OGs leading the Global Stars 11-1, and no basketball was played for 18 minutes. In terms of actual on-court time, if the final was timed, there was just shy of 12 minutes — a real NBA quarter — actually played.

Ratings will come out in the next day or so and that will tell a bigger tale of the tournament — whether fans watched and if they liked it all.

“I don’t know how it looked on TV,” Curry said. “But I thought it was a step in the right direction.”

The trade deadline is gone. The All-Star break is about to end. Luka Doncic is with the Los Angeles Lakers.Jimmy Butler is with the Golden State Warriors. Anthony Davis is with the Dallas Mavericks, though it’s unknown when he’ll play again.

The dust has settled. It’s time for the stretch run.

Here comes the fun part of the season. Every club has between 26 and 30 games remaining in this 7 1/2-week sprint to the April 13 finish line, play resuming Wednesday when Charlotte faces the Lakers. And teams will point to recent history as proof that just getting into the playoffs means anything can happen: No. 5, No. 6, No. 7 and No. 8 seeds have made their way to the conference finals in the last two years alone.

“I’m looking forward to the challenge,” said the Warriors’ Stephen Curry, the now two-time All-Star Game MVP. “It’s basically a playoff game every single night, and that usually brings the best out of you.”

Some teams can go ahead and start planning for the playoffs.

Oklahoma City and Cleveland are both 44-10, tied for the best record in the league. Defending champion Boston, currently No. 2 in the Eastern Conference, remains on pace to obliterate league records for 3-pointers made and attempted in a season. The Celtics, New York, Denver, Houston and the Lakers all have winning percentages over .600, which is an excellent sign — 132 of the last 133 teams to reach the break with such a record have wound up making the postseason.

“We have obviously a pretty good basketball team,” said Oklahoma City All-Star guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the current MVP favorite according to BetMGM Sportsbook. “We have a little bit more experience. We have an opportunity to, for sure, win an NBA championship. Now we’re going to have to earn it.”

Then there’s the other end of the spectrum, that being the teams that are out of the mix.

Over the last 20 seasons, 98.8% of the teams that have winning percentages under .400 at the break wind up missing the playoffs. If that form holds, that eliminates Philadelphia, Brooklyn, Toronto, Charlotte, Utah, New Orleans and Washington.

So, based on the numbers, that means seven teams are in, seven teams are out, and 16 teams remain in the middle fighting for what will be the last nine playoff spots — five to be clinched on or before the end of the regular season on April 13, four others to be won in the play-in tournament later that week.

“The last 25 to 30 games are really important for everyone,” said Miami guard Tyler Herro, the league’s new 3-point shootout champion. “We’ve got a new group, in a sense, and we’re going to hit the ground running. It’s going to happen fast. Everything is going to matter throughout this next month and a half.”

The Heat traded Butler to the Warriors, getting back Andrew Wiggins in return. San Antonio landed De’Aaron Fox from Sacramento, and the Los Angeles Clippers — who have barely had Kawhi Leonard available this season, but he’s playing now — figure they’re right in the mix to challenge as well.

“I think we got a really good chance,” Clippers All-Star guard James Harden said. “We added some shooting, we added some defense and obviously with a healthy Kawhi we’ve got a chance to compete with anybody. So, I think for us, it’s just finding out how we want to play and attacking it.”

Milwaukee added Kyle Kuzma, moving Khris Middleton — a Bucks mainstay for years — to Washington in that deal. And Phoenix didn’t trade Kevin Durant, which is a sign that the Suns are hoping their star trio of him, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal can make a push.

“We’re all figuring it out, man,” Durant said. “We’ve got 28, 29 games to go to figure it out. That’s the fun part, trying to figure out how to get out of a slump.”

Davis’ injury obviously isn’t great for Dallas, especially with it compounded by a rash of other injuries to the Mavericks’ big-man corps. Doncic is still working his way back into form after a calf issue, so he and James will still likely need some time to figure out the best way for this new star duo to work. Butler went to the Warriors with hopes of being the jolt that gets Curry, Draymond Green and coach Steve Kerr back to title contention.

But a lot of teams have hope. And they all know that now’s the time to make a move. Let the stretch run begin.

“I think, 27 games or so left to make a push,” Curry said. “All we want is just to get into a playoff series and have a fighting chance to be a tough out against anybody in the West, and we have a good opportunity in front of us to do that.”