A Spectacular Finish
The highlight of Saturday’s NBA All-Star Skills challenge might have been a dunk. They have a separate contest for slam dunking. But Derrick Rose of the Chicago Bulls finished off his run in the finals with a beautiful slam dunk that had the crowd applauding.
Rose beat Devin Harris of the New Jersey Nets, 35.3 to 39.7 seconds. The skills contest is for the short guys, the guards. It tests their ability to make a chest pass and a bounce pass, to dribble through pylons and to make a jump shot and a lay-up.
The passes are the hardest part, especially the bounce pass. The ball has to go through three rings in the bounce pass and sometimes it makes it through the first ring but not the second or third.
Harris drew praise for his speed dribbling through the pylons but then he lost some time in the bounce pass, which he didn’t get through the rings until his third try. Then it took him four attempts to make the jump shot from the top of the key.
Rose was smooth in his finals run. His first two passes went right through the rings and he only needed two tries on the jump shot. He needed two attempts on the second chest pass test but once he made that, he gathered some speed through the final pylons and then did a spectacular reverse dunk. His head nearly touched the rim. It was pretty. Especially for a point guard.
