Timberwolves guard Zach LaVine is the back-to-back NBA Slam Dunk Champion, but since he will hand over his title tonight, let’s take a moment to relive his best dunks of the competition.
Over the past two years, Timberwolves guard Zach LaVine has had — quite possibly hands down — the best two Slam Dunk Contest performances since Vince Carter‘s dominant showing back in 2000.
Prior to his recent ACL tear, LaVine was already not going to defend his title and shoot for the first three-peat in the history of the contest. It was in part due to a nagging hip injury, but also simply because it’s hard to keep winning that competition.
In honor of just how insane the past two years were on All-Star Saturday Night (and with Karl-Anthony Towns dominance in last year’s Skills Competition, especially 2016), let’s take a look back.
Here’s a compilation of his dunks from his shocking performance during his rookie year, back in February of 2015.
And here’s a look at the back-and-forth, overtime battle between LaVine and the Orlando Magic’s Aaron Gordon just 12 months ago.
It’s a shame that we’ll almost certainly never be treated to LaVine on the All-Star Saturday Night stage. But there are a group of guys out there who want LaVine’s dunks to live on forever — so much so that they tried to replicate what they deemed were LaVine’s top-four dunks over the past two contests.
My take? Well, let’s first get it out of the way that we don’t know how many tries it took these guys to nail LaVine’s dunks. Remember, Zach made them all on the first or second try — on the biggest dunk stage that there is.
The first dunk was impressive and probably the best/closest of the bunch, but not as smooth as LaVine’s 2015 Space Jam Slam. LaVine seemed to get higher and glide a bit more. The nuts and bolts of the dunk were absolutely there, however.
The second dunk was less impressive, as the ball seemed to barely sneak over the rim, whether due to lack of hang time or hand size, I’m not sure. But it was a little herky-jerky.
The third dunk…wasn’t at all the same as LaVine’s free throw line dunk, but the power and authority with which it was thrown down was nice.
The fourth dunk was probably the cleanest, although not to the example that was given of LaVine’s own dunk. It was similar to one of LaVine’s other baseline dunks, and while the ball didn’t get quite as low as on LaVine’s, it was a great dunk.
Next: Karl-Anthony Towns Works Out With Sasquatch (Video)
The moral of the story? Zach LaVine is one of the best dunkers ever, and these guys appear to at least be able to hang with him. An impressive display, to be sure.