The NBA this year tried to revive the least important competition of All Star Saturday, the Skills Challenge, with a new format over three rounds. Three teams consisting of three players faced each other: the Team Jazz (Clarkson, Kessler, Sexton) eventually got the better of Team Antetokounmpo (with Jrue Holiday replacing Giannis) and Team Rooks (Banchero, Smith Jr, and Ivey).
Team Jazz win the team shooting round to win #KiaSkills!#StateFarmSaturday on TNT pic.twitter.com/SBDltATtwi
– #NBAAllStar (@NBAAllStar) February 19, 2023
The rookies won the first round, a “classic” Skills Challenge speed race. The second round, which consisted of passing the ball inside targets of different sizes, went instead to Team Jazz. The latter then also won the third round, which could have overturned the score: it was a shooting competition, whoever scored the most points in 1′ of clock time.
Overall the experiment cannot be said to have succeeded: all three triplets made some discrete figures, with the last round being really bad. Team Jazz won by scoring only 11 points in one minute, Team Antetokounmpo stopped at 8 while Team Rooks even at 3.
This is it. The saddest tweet ever. They really said he went off in team passing. https://t.co/XDvb36Djkk
– Jay King (@ByJayKing) February 19, 2023
