NBA ALL-STAR WEEKEND

February 10, 2001

Desmond Mason

DESMOND MASON: I'm happy. I'm happy to win this. I dedicate it to all of the people I lost in Oklahoma State, those ten lives that were taken away. I dedicate this to them, something special for them.

DESMOND MASON: Not very much at all. I just wanted to come out and just be relaxed. Ended up still being nervous, but, you know, I just wanted to come out and have fun, doing what I like to do, dunk the ball, and actually I had an opportunity to win this trophy. It was a great situation to be in. This is a lifelong dream to come out and be in All-Star Weekend and participate in the dunk contest. It's been fun for me.

DESMOND MASON: It's the worst feeling ever. You've got all of those people screaming at you, players on the sidelines trying to pump you up. You miss one and it takes a little bit out of you. I missed my first one and I started thinking, "I've got to come out with something big and had to get some points." My teammate helped me get a big score and kept me in the battle. I think you've got to go out and relax. All of the young guys, first- and second-year guys, I think everybody was nervous. It was not the strongest dunk contest ever, but it was fun doing it.

DESMOND MASON: I was off balance. Did I kick you? I think I just lost the ball. I lost the ball and they gave me another chance. They called it a missed dunk. But I made it the next time.

DESMOND MASON: I missed it like three or four times. I kept hitting my shorts. Every time I would take it between my legs, I hit my shorts. I decided to try something different. Tried it three times and could not get the ball through. I just tried something different and it kind of held out for me at the end.

DESMOND MASON: It's a blessing to have a guy like that, just involved in something like this for the young guys. Like I said, all of these guys are young. This is a big opportunity for them to get their faces known and to have Dr. J judging it is just extra special. I had the opportunity to meet him, and that was the big thing for me.

DESMOND MASON: That situation has been really rough for me to deal with. I had the opportunity to go down and actually spend some time with the families. You know, one of my best friends was on the plane, and I never had the opportunity to meet his mom and it was bad that I had to meet her that way, but it put some closure on the situation for everybody. I dedicate this to them. I looked at his pictures last night and I looked at his pictures today. But life is rough and you've got to go on. Just got to find a way to deal with it and hopefully help the family along the way.

DESMOND MASON: That was a nice dunk. I kind of knew. A little bird told me that something that he was going to do, and he pulled it off. If I could do a flip, I probably would have tried it, too, so I wouldn't hurt myself trying. But you have to be creative and you have to be unique because there's been so many that have been seen over and over. They don't get the big scores anymore. So you have to come up with your own stuff.

DESMOND MASON: It's hard to get your teammates involved on something that you like being really creative about it because all you can do is have them tee it up and you can dunk it or have them throw it to you. There's not much more to it. But to have the minimum of one dunk, maybe you find something creative about that, but I think most guys like to dunk on their own, their own creativity their own style. But a bunch of dunks have been taken away from guys and the scores are just not high, you have to find something new. I think everybody is kind of looking for that now.

DESMOND MASON: I thought he could see through the blindfold at first, but I guess obviously he cannot. He went up and it was about three feet from the goal when he tried to dunk it. But that's being creative. That's what you have to do to win and if he would have made that he probably would have got a 50, so you can't knock him too much.