Obi Toppin went between-the-legs off the backboard to win the ATTSlamDunk Championship!
Follow Us
Obi Toppin received his comeuppance as his NBA All-Star dunk contest opponents self-destructed. Obi, the New York Knicks’ second-year forward, won convincingly after placing second last year in one of the most lackluster, anticlimactic, and mishap-filled games in NBA history. Toppin, 23, had a consistent but unspectacular effort in the last round, defeating Golden State Warriors forward Juan Toscano-Anderson 92-69.
Toppin said, “There’s been a lot of legends to win the dunk contest who attended college at Dayton, a three-hour drive from Cleveland. “For my name to be part of that is something special, and I don’t take that for granted. It means a lot to do it in Ohio. This is like my second home.”
To clinch the victory, Toppin, who stands 6-foot-9 and is one of the season’s most prolific dunkers, hurled an alley-oop to himself off the backboard to set up a windmill.
READ MORE: Ginobili, Johnson, Cash – Finalists for 2022 Basketball Hall of Fame class
On his last dunk, he touched the ball against the backboard before swiftly redirecting it into the basket. Those dunks propelled him to victory, particularly after he broke new ground in the opening round.
Toppin performed his iconic slam by passing the ball behind his back while jumping over a human prop, dunk teacher Chuck Millan, and then finishing with a flawless right-handed finish.
? @obitoppin1 shows off his #ATTSlamDunk trophy! pic.twitter.com/jshhxEWk3k
— NBA (@NBA) February 20, 2022
This year’s celebration regained customary components that were sacrificed owing to the outbreak the previous year.
The usual four-person field returned, as did a two-round format in which each contender threw down two dunks in the first round, and the top two finishers advanced to the finals for two additional dunks apiece.
Toscano-Anderson, the long shot in the field, advanced past Houston Rockets player Jalen Green and Orlando Magic guard Cole Anthony to the final by getting contest judge Julius Erving to sign his basketball and then vaulting over his Warriors teammate Andrew Wiggins for a clean finish.
In contrast, his final two dunks were flops: a failed effort to imitate Vince Carter’s elbow dunk and a between-the-legs attempt from the baseline that he couldn’t execute after three tries. While fans enjoyed his jersey homage to two-time winner Jason Richardson, his dead legs caught up with him as he ran out of steam.
Green, the contest’s centerpiece and the No. 2 selection in the 2021 draught missed a sequence of dunks to start his night and never recovered. His effort to garner attention by flashing a gold chain and holding a phone that played his own highlights was swiftly forgotten. Anthony attempted to energize the audience by wearing Timberland boots and his father, Gregold,’s Knicks jersey for his first dunk, but his performance was marred by missed shots.
By the end of the night, most of the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse audience had lost interest, and Toppin’s victory received little applause.
