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Oklahoma City’s Hamidou Diallo made me believe in the value of the NBA Dunk Contest again after putting on a show en route to becoming Dunk Contest Champion. The 6’5” 20-year-old rookie edged out Dennis Smith Jr. in the finals, but really won it with his second dunk over 7’1” legend Shaquille O’Neal.
Diallo earned a perfect 50 on the dunk, which paid tribute to two of Vince Carter’s most famous dunks–the elbow dunk during the 2000 dunk contest and Carter’s dunk over Frederic Weis at the 2000 Olympics, arguably the greatest dunk in competition ever caught on tape.
"SUPERMAN IS IN THE BUILDING!" @hamidoudiallo WITH THE ELBOW DUNK OVER SHAQ. 😱😱😱#ATTSlamDunk pic.twitter.com/w7VB0Nw2UR
— NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) February 17, 2019
NBA History did God’s work by compiling every perfect score dunk in the history of the contest–from Jordan’s foul line jam to Aaron Gordon’s supremely underrated under-the-leg, over-the-mascot dunk, to Dwight Howard’s questionable dunk in the 2008 contest.
This is great – via @NBAHistory
Every 50-point dunk in NBA Slam Dunk Contest history: pic.twitter.com/knnmoyByJB
— Tommy Beer (@TommyBeer) February 18, 2019
These thunderous woofers come in stark contrast to the below clip of the worst dunk contest attempts in history. These are straight laughable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XpU1P8ap6k
Thoughts and prayers to 2005 Chris “Birdman” Andersen, who took 15 attempts to complete two dunks.