All Star Weekend has come and gone, and the results are in. All in all it was a pretty successful weekend. All Star Saturday entertained us with big men taking their shots at the skills challenge, a record breaking performance in the 3-point contest, and some drama in the dunk contest.

But would the game’s new format and increased payout to the winners lead to a more competitive game? Last year’s 192-182 spectacle left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. No defensive effort and a lot of points being scored at will.

This season marked the first time the NBA would deviate from its traditional East vs. West format in favor of the 2 highest vote getters being selected as captains and picking from the pool of starters and reserves.

Many felt that Team LeBron had an advantage over Team Steph due to LBJ picking guys with size and length as opposed to Steph’s approach in picking a more guard oriented lineup with bigs having guard-like athleticism, and who’s game was more suited for an uptempo style.

At the outset it looked as though Team Steph and his band of “snipers” were gonna run away with this game. But late in the 2nd quarter Team LeBron introduced some real defense that befuddled Team Steph and made it a close game at half time.

The 2nd half was close throughout until Team Steph opened up a double digit lead well into the 4th quarter. But with 2-minutes to play, Team LeBron starting cutting into that lead. Again, it was real defense that did it. Team LeBron began trapping and stealing, enabling them to take control with under a minute to play.

Team Steph had an opportunity to send it to overtime but was not even able to get off a shot as Team LeBron executed a perfect half court trap as time expired.

It’s always been said that defense wins championships, turns out defense also wins all star games. At the very least this game was truly entertaining. These were the best players in the world putting on a show that both they and their fans could be proud of.

The NBA might be on to something here. The new format appears to be a success. After all, the talent distribution between the eastern and western conferences is skewed towards the west, having made the last few games yawn-fests.

Next year the league has said that the all star draft will be televised. This will no doubt increase ratings and get fans excited about the impending matchup.

Kudos to you Adam Silver, I think you’re onto something here!