Damian Lillard Went Full Dame Time And Defended His 3PT Contest Title In Thrilling Fashion

Stacy Revere. Getty Images.

If there's one thing that I'd say generally delivers year after year during All Star Weekend, it's the 3PT contest. There's just something about watching the best shooters on the planet go on a run behind the arc that will always be awesome. Given the fact that the NBA has made the Skills Competition a disaster, the 3PT shootout has always been what I consider the true start to Saturday night's festivities.

So it was no surprise that this year's contest delivered like so many had before. The trio of Trae, Haliburton, and Dame all throwing up opening round 26s was certainly impressive

Given the quality of shooters in this competition, realistically you had to be around the 24-26 range to even have a chance, and after Dame survived the ties to enter the Finals with a chance to defend his 3PT title

At this point as a Bucks fan, I'm loving life. Why? Because Dame's three point shooting has been a disaster for about a month now. If this is the thing that helps him catch a rhythm, that could change the course of their second half push. 

A Finals of Trae Young, the greatest three point shooting big man in NBA history (look it up), and the defending champ certainly wasn't a bad final group, and as expected Trae and KAT hit the 24 mark in their rounds which put all the pressure in the world on Dame Time

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Hey now, there was real suspense there! Given how Dame started his first rack I figured he was going to cruise to this win. I've seen that locked in Dame before, and then once he started to make his bonus shots too, I figured it was a wrap. And yet, that final rack can be a real bitch sometimes. Suddenly you miss the first few and you start to panic. The crowd gets tense, and before we knew it there was a chance we were witnessing an epic choke.

But then Dame grabbed that final money ball, let that shit fly and that was that. Back to back champ

While we didn't get anything historic like the time Steph went for 31, I'd still say the 3PT contest lived up to the hype. The totals were high, guys went on runs, and the Finals had some tense moments with a walkoff finish. I'm pretty sure that's exactly how you draw up a contest like this.

Now all we need is the Dunk Contest to do the same and not be completely terrible and we may have a successful All Star Saturday Night on our hands!