CHICAGO — No one involved in the 2020 NBA All-Star Game could predict how the new scoring format would affect the game. Chris Paul, head of the Players Association, lobbied the commissioner Adam Silver to adopt the Elam Ending this year — a rule change in which the teams play to a final number rather than against a dwindling game clock.
The league agreed and took the idea a step further, awarding charity money to the team that won each individual quarter before tallying up the cumulative scores in the final frame and playing to an extra 24 points (a tribute to Kobe Bryant) to determine the winner. The result was a thrilling fourth quarter that ultimately ended on an Anthony Davis free throw to give Team LeBron a 157-155 win over Team Giannis.
NBA All-Stars sounded off on the format change after the game. This is what the players and coaches in the game thought of the new scoring system.
KEMBA WALKER: Yeah, I thought it was cool. I had no idea coming into the game, I didn’t know what to expect. As we played, it was great. That’s what everybody wants to see. They want to see a competitive game. That’s what it was in the fourth. Hopefully, we can keep it going.
GIANNIS ANTETOKOUNMPO: After the game, my brother came down, and he said, this has been the most fun All-Star he’s been a part of. And I asked him why, and he told me, “Because you guys were really competitive. You guys were playing to win.” Team Giannis, that’s what we were trying to do. We were trying to come out, set the tone, play hard. Especially in the fourth quarter, the defense got tighter. Guys were hitting one another. Every possession counts. We had a little bit of playoff intensity out there. So I loved it. I hope we can keep the same format for a lot of years, and I think people had fun, we had fun. So that’s what it’s all about.
JIMMY BUTLER: It was dope. Damn sure got to compete at the end. It’s still fun to go out there and be known as one of the best players in the world in this league. Hopefully it stays like that.
JOEL EMBIID: It was great. Fun weekend. Probably one of the best All-Star Games ever. Guys competed. It came down to basically the last shot. I don’t agree that you should be able to win on a free throw, but overall it was a lot of fun.
Reporter: Do you think they should stick with this format for future All-Star Games?
EMBIID: For sure. Besides the first quarter, I felt like everybody was playing hard. It was competitive.
KYLE LOWRY: We wanted to win. We’ll do anything it takes to win a basketball game. I think the format was great for everybody. The change helped the whole experience. I think it was one of those things where we innovated. In our league we always try to do different things, and it worked out perfectly.
ANTHONY DAVIS: I feel like playing in the end was a playoff game. It was a great competition. It’s 24 players who want to compete at a very high level and to do it in front of a crowd like this. New format, everybody in the game really loved it. Like I said, it was a fun competition. It was great.
Reporter: Now that the game is over, your opinion about the new format?
DAVIS: It was great. We love it. It brings competition back, especially during the fourth quarter — it’s about getting stops. You have to get stops to win the game. It was great. We all loved it.
Reporter: Is this something that you hope the league considers long term?
DAVIS: Absolutely. For the seven I’ve been in, this has been probably one of the better ones. You actually have to compete. You argue with the refs. It felt like a real playoff game and that’s what makes it fun.
Reporter: A lot of people seem to feel as if this format is good for the game, but some are saying the game maybe shouldn’t end on a free throw. I’m curious as to what you think about that.
KAWHI LEONARD: I mean, it’s a point, so we can’t take out free throws through the whole game. They pretty much made the last six or seven free throws towards the end. They kept giving them. So do we want to minus those points as well? But the new format was good. I felt like it was fun in that fourth quarter.
NICK NURSE: Well, I think it was really interesting. It was really fun. Each and every quarter was, from a coaching standpoint was really fun. I thought the quarters got really interesting really early in the quarters because the game was moving pretty quick. Not a ton of whistles in the first bit, right? So the thing kind of mattered a little bit. I think with the cumulative score, even though we were down in the first quarter, we thought we had to keep plugging to keep it close so it doesn’t get too far away. Then when we were on the other side of it, we said let’s keep increasing our lead and get as big of an advantage going into the fourth. Then, obviously, the end was amazing. I think everybody in the whole place was on their feet watching each possession, and they were really going at it. I mean, defensively it was hard to get anything — or offensively it was hard to get anything started. Even first passes were being denied. It felt like the end of a playoff game, which was really cool, I thought.
Reporter: Could you take us into the final quarter. We saw a very competitive game, which is something that we haven’t seen in the All-Star Game for a long time. What changed this year?
FRANK VOGEL: I think the format probably had something to do with it, but I do think that, while a lot of the All-Star games have not been competitive, usually when it’s close down the stretch, it becomes very competitive. I think with the format the way it was, first team to get to that 157 mark, I think it just became more competitive a little bit longer. But it’s not uncommon for All-Star games to get competitive down the stretch when they’re close.
Reporter: LeBron, did this format live up to what you were expecting? Other than maybe a Finals game, when’s the last time you played in a fourth quarter that had that much intensity, that much fight to it?
LeBRON JAMES: I didn’t know what to expect because it was a new format, new year. None of us knew what to expect. But throughout the whole fourth quarter and at the end of the game, everybody was like, “That was pretty damn fun.” That was fun. Having to play for a set number and seeing that — I’ve watched a lot of basketball in the summertime, and I forgot the name of the league where the guys, you know, their alma mater, they go back and play for their teams and things of that nature, they have a set number they have to get to that, that $2 million championship tournament. Maybe you don’t watch basketball in the summer.
Reporter: TBT.
JAMES: Yeah, that was extremely fun and a great way to end 2020 NBA All-Star Weekend.
Reporter: You’ve obviously played a lot of basketball in your career. What did you think of adding on a free throw instead of old playground rules with an actual bucket?
JAMES: It doesn’t matter. At the end of the day, you can win a Finals game at the free-throw line. There’s a lot of things that happen on the playground that you can’t do in our game too, where you can literally foul every single time and not get disqualified. I’ve been in games where you’ve won games at the free-throw line, and that’s all part of the game. If he would have missed both, no one would have been talking about it. It’s all part of the game, and it was a hell of a way to win a game just from an All-Star perspective.
Reporter: Do you think the All-Star Game is back because of the competitive game we saw?
CHRIS PAUL: I’m obviously biased. I don’t think it ever went anywhere. I know I’m always competitive whenever I play. But the good thing about our league is we’re always adding things and trying new things and trying to figure out from my fans what they like. This was an idea I brought to Adam. Thankfully, we tried it out, so I was asking the guys how they enjoyed it during the game and at the end of the game. So you all be sure to ask him.
RUSSELL WESTBROOK: It was good. We won.
JAMES HARDEN: It was different (than previous experiences) because being down, we had to get to a certain number. It made us play even harder to get to that number. There was no running the clock out. You had to actually score the basketball. No time — just shot clock and you gotta get a bucket. The charities, the fans, the game got exciting. I think the fans got more into it. It was cool. Everybody was so competitive, ready to win the game. We were coming up with different strategies every time to score, to get a stop. It was pretty cool to strategize on every possession.
Reporter: Do you think Kobe would have liked the competitiveness in the fourth quarter?
HARDEN: That was the competitive dog he was. He was a competitive beast. That right there made it.
DETROIT (AP) — The Detroit Red Wings made another investment this week in a young standout, signing Moritz Seider to a seven-year contract worth nearly $60 million.
The Red Wings announced the move with the 23-year-old German defenseman on Thursday, three days after keeping 22-year-old forward Lucas Raymond with a $64.6 million, eight-year deal.
Detroit drafted Seider with the No. 6 pick overall eight years ago and he has proven to be a great pick. He has 134 career points, the most by a defenseman drafted in 2019.
He was the NHL’s only player to have at least 200 hits and block 200-plus shots last season, when he scored a career-high nine goals and had 42 points for the second straight year.
Seider won the Calder Trophy as the league’s top rookie in 2022 after he had a career-high 50 points.
Red Wings general manager Steve Yzerman is banking on Seider, whose contract will count $8.55 million annually against the cap, and Raymond to turn a rebuilding team into a winner.
Detroit has failed to make the playoffs in eight straight seasons, the longest postseason drought in franchise history.
The Red Wings, who won four Stanley Cups from 1997 to 2008, have been reeling since their run of 25 straight postseasons ended in 2016.
Detroit was 41-32-9 last season and finished with a winning record for the first time since its last playoff appearance.
Yzerman re-signed Patrick Kane last summer and signed some free agents, including Vladimir Tarasenko to a two-year contract worth $9.5 million after he helped the Florida Panthers hoist the Cup.
Veterans Tyson Beukeboom and Karen Paquin will lead Canada at the WXV 1 women’s rugby tournament starting later this month in the Vancouver area.
WXV 1 includes the top three teams from the Women’s Six Nations (England, France and Ireland) and the top three teams from the Pacific Four Series (Canada, New Zealand, and the United States).
Third-ranked Canada faces No. 4 France, No. 7 Ireland and No. 1 England in the elite division of the three-tiered WXV tournament that runs Sept. 29 to Oct. 12 in Vancouver and Langley, B.C. No. 2 New Zealand and the eighth-ranked U.S. make up the six-team WVX 1 field.
“Our preparation time was short but efficient. This will be a strong team,” Canada coach Kevin Rouet said in a statement. “All the players have worked very hard for the last couple of weeks to prepare for WXV and we are excited for these next three matches and for the chance to play on home soil here in Vancouver against the best rugby teams in the world.
“France, Ireland and England will each challenge us in different ways but it’s another opportunity to test ourselves and another step in our journey to the Rugby World Cup next year.”
Beukeboom serves as captain in the injury absence of Sophie de Goede. The 33-year-old from Uxbridge, Ont., earned her Canadian-record 68th international cap in Canada’s first-ever victory over New Zealand in May at the Pacific Four Series.
Twenty three of the 30 Canadian players selected for WXV 1 were part of that Pacific Four Series squad.
Rouet’s roster includes the uncapped Asia Hogan-Rochester, Caroline Crossley and Rori Wood.
Hogan-Rochester and Crossley were part of the Canadian team that won rugby sevens silver at the Paris Olympics, along with WXV teammates Fancy Bermudez, Olivia Apps, Alysha Corrigan and Taylor Perry. Wood is a veteran of five seasons at UBC.
The 37-year-old Paquin, who has 38 caps for Canada including the 2014 Rugby World Cup, returns to the team for the first time since the 2021 World Cup.
Canada opens the tournament Sept. 29 against France at B.C. Place Stadium in Vancouver before facing Ireland on Oct. 5 at Willoughby Stadium at Langley Events Centre, and England on Oct. 12 at B.C. Place.
The second-tier WXV 2 and third-tier WXV 3 are slated to run Sept. 27 to Oct. 12, in South Africa and Dubai, respectively.
WXV 2 features Australia, Italy, Japan, Scotland, South Africa and Wales while WXV 3 is made up of Fiji, Hong Kong, Madagascar, the Netherlands, Samoa and Spain.
The tournament has 2025 World Cup qualification implications, although Canada, New Zealand and France, like host England, had already qualified by reaching the semifinals of the last tournament.
Ireland, South Africa, the U.S., Japan, Fiji and Brazil have also booked their ticket, with the final six berths going to the highest-finishing WXV teams who have not yet qualified through regional tournaments.
Canada’s Women’s Rugby Team WXV 1 Squad
Forwards
Alexandria Ellis, Ottawa, Stade Français Paris (France); Brittany Kassil, Guelph, Ont., Guelph Goats; Caroline Crossley, Victoria, Castaway Wanderers; Courtney Holtkamp, Rimbey, Alta., Red Deer Titans Rugby; DaLeaka Menin, Vulcan, Alta., Exeter Chiefs (England); Emily Tuttosi, Souris, Man., Exeter Chiefs (England); Fabiola Forteza, Quebec City, Stade Bordelais (France); Gabrielle Senft, Regina, Saracens (England); Gillian Boag, Calgary, Gloucester-Hartpury (England); Julia Omokhuale, Calgary, Leicester Tigers (England); Karen Paquin, Quebec City, Club de rugby de Quebec; Laetitia Royer, Loretteville, Que., ASM Romagnat (France); McKinley Hunt, King City, Ont., Saracens (England); Pamphinette Buisa, Gatineau, Que., Ottawa Irish; Rori Wood, Sooke, B.C., College Rifles RFC; Sara Cline, Edmonton, Leprechaun Tigers; Tyson Beukeboom, Uxbridge, Ont., Ealing Trailfinders (England);
Backs
Alexandra Tessier, Sainte-Clotilde-de-Horton, Que., Exeter Chiefs (England); Alysha Corrigan, Charlottetown, P.E.I., CRFC; Asia Hogan-Rochester, Toronto, Toronto Nomads; Claire Gallagher, Caledon, Ont., Leicester Tigers (England); Fancy Bermudez, Edmonton, Saracens (England); Julia Schell, Uxbridge, Ont., Ealing Trailfinders (England); Justine Pelletier, Rivière-du-Loup, Que, Stade Bordelais (France); Mahalia Robinson, Fulford, Que., Town of Mount Royal RFC; Olivia Apps, Lindsay, Ont., Lindsay RFC; Paige Farries, Red Deer, Alta., Saracens (England); Sara Kaljuvee, Ajax, Ont., Westshore RFC; Shoshanah Seumanutafa, White Rock, B.C., Counties Manukau (New Zealand); Taylor Perry, Oakville, Ont., Exeter Chiefs (England).
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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 18, 2024.
PENTICTON, B.C. – Vancouver Canucks goalie Thatcher Demko says he’s been working his way back from a rare lower-body muscle injury since being sidelined in last season’s playoffs.
The 28-year-old all star says the rehabilitation process has been frustrating, but he has made good progress in recent weeks and is confident he’ll be able to return to playing.
He says he and his medical team have spent the last few months talking to specialists around the world, and have not found a single other hockey player who has dealt with the same injury.
Demko missed several weeks of the last season with a knee ailment and played just one game in Vancouver’s playoff run last spring before going down with the current injury.
He was not on the ice with his teammates as the Canucks started training camp in Penticton, B.C., on Thursday, but skated on his own before the sessions began.
Demko posted a 35-14-2 record with a .918 percentage, a 2.45 goals-against average and five shutouts for Vancouver last season.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
