As the top, young players in the NBA were on display Friday night, fans were treated to an entertaining affair filled with high-flying dunks, alley-oops and friendly trash talk.
New Orleans Pelicans rookie Zion Williamson provided the dunks, Memphis Grizzlies rookie Ja Morant had the eye-popping passes and second-round pick Eric Paschall of the Golden State Warriors issued the trash-talk to his competitors in the NBA Rising Stars Game.
Paschall scored a team-high 23 points to lead Team USA to a 151-131 win over the World Team. With his team trailing by 12 points in the third quarter, Paschall helped key the comeback, using some trash talk to help his team get back into the game.
The former Villanova product even had an aggressive back-and-forth with former Michigan forward Moritz Wagner, who Paschall faced in the 2018 NCAA National Championship Game. His Wildcats defeated the Wolverines, which rekindled the rivalry.
Afterward, Paschall called it friendly trash talk between two competitors.
That’s my competitive edge, seeing that we’re losing. Talk a little trash, get a few buckets and have some fun. It was more of going out there to play a little harder, and let’s go have fun. That’s what we did in the second half.
Though Paschall led the U.S. in scoring, Miles Bridges earned MVP honors with 20 points, five rebounds and five assists as one of the sophomores on the roster.
[vertical-gallery id=11659]