The NBA All-Star Weekend is in full force in Charlotte, North Carolina with the who’s who of hip hop participating in the festivities.
During Saturday (Feb. 16) night’s dunk contest, New York Knicks star Dennis Smith Jr. made the night memorable by using J. Cole as the ultimate prop.
During his second dunk of the night, Smith, rocking J. Cole’s high school jersey, launched over Cole who was sitting in a chair with the ball propped over his head for the assist.
Naturally, the collab between the Fayetteville, North Carolina natives garnered a perfect score from the judges as the crowd went wild. Cole tried to dunk himself, but fell short.
Cole and Smith’s friendship goes way beyond their love for their hometown. Cole shouted out Smith on 21 Savage’s “A Lot,” and attended some of his games when he played for the Dallas Mavericks.
Cole wasn’t the only prop at this year’s dunk contest. The winner, Oklahoma City Thunder rookie Hamidou Diallo, had a series of dunks that restored the feeling of the contest.
Diallo’s first dunk saw a pass off assist from teammate Russell Westbrook. The windmill dunk earned him a score of 48 out of 50. Round two found Diallo searching for the tallest person in the stadium. Naturally, he chose Shaq to help him out. Diallo launched over the 7′ 1″ Hall of Famer and landed an elbow in the rim, Vince Carter-inspired dunk on the first try. Afterwards, he revealed a Superman shirt under his jersey, paying homage to Shaq.
In the final dunk, Diallo used Quavo as his stand-in prop, etching him as the clear winner after Smith had difficulties landing his dunks. Now, Diallo has his eyes on 2020’s dunk contest. According to Ben Golliver of the Washington Post, Diallo is looking forward to Duke University’s Zion Williamson joining the NBA so they can have a rematch of their high school dunk contest at next year’s dunk contest in Chicago.
J. Cole will perform the halftime show at the NBA All-Star game tonight (Feb. 17) at 8 pm ET on TNT.