15
NEW ORLEANS — Jason Kapono would put the big, silver trophy he earned for his second-straight NBA three-point shooting contest in his locker at the Air Canada Centre, but he's worried he might make his teammates jealous.
"I think it would upset a few guys," said Kapono the Toronto Raptors sharp-shooter whose deadpan is nearly as deadly as his three-point stroke. "We have a very talented team with a lot of guys who shoot threes. I don't want them all staring at my trophy because it might screw them up a little bit."
He's going to put in his bathroom, so "every time I take a shower, or brush my teeth I'll start my day out staring at this beautiful trophy right here."
But Kapono did screw up one of his teammates a little bit as his slightly off-centre pass might have cost Jamario Moon a spot in the finals of a hotly contested slam-dunk competition eventually won by the Orlando Magic's Dwight Howard.
Wearing a Superman costume, Dwight Howard flies toward the basket during the slam dunk contest Saturday at the NBA All Star weekend in New Orleans. (Eric Gay/The Associated Press)
Related Articles
Photogallery
Related Information
- Daniel Gibson
- Gerald Green
- Richard Hamilton
- Dwight Howard
- Jason Kapono
- Jamario Moon
- Jamario Moon
- Steve Nash
- Dirk Nowitzki
- Peja Stojakovic
Moon missed a spot in the final by one point.
On his first dunk Moon tossed a lob and caught it off the bounce in mid-air for a spinning, one-handed 360 that earned 46 points. But after Gerald Green had accumulated 91 points on his two dunks, Moon needed at least 46 on his second.
He laid a piece of tape down two feet outside the foul line — or about 17 feet from the rim — and enlisted Kapono to throw a bounce pass that he was going to catch and dunk in one motion.
The problem was Kapono's toss drifted to Moon's left-hand side forcing Moon to adjust in mid-air and dunk left-handed. It was a remarkable athletic effort, but not the dunk as planned and Moon earned just 44 points for a total of 90.
"I wanted it on my right, but wherever he threw it I was going to go get it, it didn't matter," said Moon, ever gracious.
A bigger factor, said Moon, was that he didn't realize he was required to do the partner dunk in the first round and felt he wasn't properly warmed up for it.
He was more upset — again with a big smile on his face — because Dwight Howard's two-foot take off from just inside the foul line, complete with a Superman cape, wasn't technically a dunk, as Howard's hand never touched the rim, making the most difficult lay-up in the history of basketball.
Technicalities aside it earned Howard his second perfect score of 50, putting him in the final with a total of 100 against the defending champion Green.
Kapono was on his own in his competition and handled himself well against the likes of Steve Nash of the Phoenix Suns, Peja Stojakovic of the New Orleans Hornets, Richard Hamilton of the Detroit Pistons, Daniel Gibson of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks.
He went last in the first round, as defending champion, and got off to a slow start. Needing 15 to avoid elimination Kapono missed three of his first five shots, but made up for it by making nine of his last 10 to finish with a first-round best 20 points
He faced off against Gibson and Nowitzki in the final. Starting last he needed 18 to beat Gibson and scored that with his second-to-last ball on the fourth rack of five and then tied the record of 25 set in 1986 by making eight of his last nine shots.
The seven-foot Howard became the biggest man to win the slam-dunk title with some remarkably creative dunks.
"It's really for the big men," said Howard. "Everybody always says big men can't jump and big men don't look good dunking. I just tried to add a little bit of my personality. With me being so tall, I knew it was going to be tough, but I just tried to play the crowd and have fun."
In addition to his Superman tribute he took the early lead on Green by tapping the ball to himself off the backboard above the square and dunking it with his other hand before placing a ball on a mini-hoop attached to one corner of the backboard, grabbing it and doing a windmill.
Green had his moment in the sun too — doing a windmill dunk in socks at one point. His best dunk was when he placed a cupcake with a burning candle on the top of the rim and blew it out before dunking in the first round.
In the end Howard prevailed, earning 78 per cent of the votes sent in by viewers via text message.
Moon felt himself a winner anyway. After spending his entire basketball career in the hinterlands of the minor leagues, he was glowing at the prospect at being at the game's centre stage.
"It was great man, it was fun. Dwight was well-deserving of that trophy, that boy's a clown, man," said Moon. "It was great man, you can't ask for anything more than this."
