On Sunday night, LeBron James participated in his latest exhibition contest. This one took place at the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City and was hosted by multiple time NBA scoring champ Kevin Durant. As is the norm in these contests, it was a high scoring, low defense matchup that gave all the fans in attendance one hell of a show.
LeBron James' ‘White team' took down Durant's ‘Blue team' in an overtime thriller by the score of 176-171. This game went down to the wire as both teams went on a scoring frenzy that forced the overtime session. Here is how the final minute went down, with the firsthand recollection coming courtesy of an Oklahoma City Thunder writer:
With 54.3 seconds left, James Harden buried a 3-pointer with the shot clock at :02 to give the Blue a 159-158 advantage.
With 33.0 seconds left, Russell Westbrook snared an offensive rebound and passed back out to Durant, who drilled a 3-pointer with 30.4 seconds left to give the White a 161-159 advantage.
With 13.1 seconds left, Carmelo Anthony hit a reverse layup against LeBron James to tie the score at 161.
With 0.7 seconds left, Durant missed a potential game winning 3-pointer and former Thunder forward Jeff Green missed an acrobatic follow-up slam at the buzzer.
Pretty crazy, eh? LeBron finished with 40 points, 9 rebounds and 8 assists to help lead his team to victory, but the star of the White Team was host of the show. Kevin Durant came away with a triple double, scoring 42 points, grabbing 26 rebounds and dishing off 11 assists. Fellow hometown hero Russell Westbrook, also on the white team, finished with 34 points and 13 rebounds.
However, the player who put up the biggest point total and was one of the biggest stars of the game was not on the winning White Team, nor was he a hometown OKC favorite. Nope, it was none other then Michael Beasley. That's right, Michael ‘Super Cool' Beasley led all scorers by dropping 56 points. Talk about ‘out of nowhere', right?
Carmelo Anthony also had a big night for the Blue Team, putting up a nice 43 point 10 rebound double double. All in all it was a great night for fans and players alike, and it ended in a very appropriate way...with everyone in attendance giving the players a standing ovation.