Sunday, March 01, 2009

Ho wins All-Star MVP, Allen takes home dunk champion

Taiwan Beer forward Ho Shou-cheng had 23 points and paced Red Team to a 108-98 win over White Team in the annual SBL All-Star Game Saturday night. U.S. import Byron Allen edged Doug Creighton 97-96 in the dunk competition.

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Allen got the perfect score of 50 on a dunk he collaborated with Taiwan Mobile teammate Wu Yong-jen, who won the three-point shootout earlier. Doug Creighton lost in the dunk final for the second consecutive year, losing last year to former U.S. star import Jon Sanders.

About 5,000 fans were in attendance of the annual festivity in Jhubei City, Hsinchu County, the first time that the league holds the All-Star Game outside of Taipei area.

Chen Shih-chieh also had 23 points for Red Team, consisted of players from Taiwan Beer, Yulon and Pure Youth. Lu Cheng-ju had 14 points and help Red Team to put the game away early, leading by more than 10 points in the second quarter.

Byron Allen, who won the dunk competition at halftime, had 21 points and 13 rebounds for White Team. Su Yi-chieh had 18 points, including three 3-pointers. Lin Yi-hui had 15 points and Lin Kwan-lun had 11. Tien Lei scored nine.

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In other events, the little guys beat the big men team 42-37 in the "Big vs. Small" exhibition game. Hong Chih-shan of Pure Youth hit five 3-pointers in the 12-minutes exhibition which match-ups players shorter than 180cm against players who are taller than 195cm. Yeah, 195cm or taller is considered "tall" in this country.

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Wu Yong-jen scored 21 points in the final round and won the 3-point shootout for the second time in his career after winning five years ago.

3-point shootout final round
Wu Yong-jen, TM 21 points
Wang Nan-kwei, KKL 16 points
Chen Ching-wen, Dacin 15 points
Chen Shun-hsiang, BOT 13 points

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Bank of Taiwan won an interesting event called "mixed-shooting competition", which has seven teams -- with each team consists of a coach, a younger player and a veteran -- shooting from seven spots on the floor. When a player made a shot from spot A, the team could move on to the next spot with the last spot in halfcourt.

BOT beat Dacin after an extra "penalty kick" session as Chen Kuo-wei made a halfcourt shot after four seconds while Dacin made one after nine seconds.

The All-Star Game drew the same criticism as it has been in the past years. But it was actually a dilemma. When players did play hard and made the game ugly, fans said that the All-Star Game was supposed to be a show. When these All-Stars tried to have fun on the floor -- just like they did last night when they turned the final three minutes into a dunk exhibition, fans said they didn't respect the game and the ticket buyers.

So what do the players have to do? I have no idea.

Dunk contest was pathetic as always. Except for a couple of dunks, most participants had a hard time finishing dunks or came up with a creative slam.

It's funny but I believe the event that provided the most drama was the mixed-shooting contest.

So the 2009 All-Star Saturday was in the past and we're ready to move on to the second half of the season. The league is moving the games back to Taipei area, a move they think would help media coverage and ticket sales. Let's wait and see.