NBA All-Star Skills Competition: History, winners & changes through the years

The 3-Point and Slam Dunk contests have been staples in the All-Star Weekend festivities of the NBA's mid-season break for well over 30 years. Rightfully so, as both types of shots have been big parts of basketball since the 1980s (outside of the period when the dunk was banned). However, with the evolution of basketball, a third competition enters its second decade as a mainstay: the Skills competition.

With more and more players having the ability to execute more and more dribble moves, being able to move at quicker speeds and making incredible passes, this competition was made for players to showcase those skills, like they do with 3-pointers and dunks. With perimeter defense and schemes in general improving, players have had to develop counters to drive by them and get to the paint to collapse defenses and create better shots. With that, dribbling has evolved massively, and thus given room for a competition like this to exist, have a variety of participants, and be fun every single time.

The first competition of this kind was held in 2003, featuring four point guards going through a course where they had to dribble, pass and make layups in the quickest time possible. The competition was won by the New Jersey Nets' Jason Kidd. Since then, the competition has featured many format changes or experiments: the one-at-a-time course was held for a while, later evolving to feature duos in 2014 (they also experimented with the Dunk Contest that weekend and it was weird), having two players going through the course at the same time, and now where, for the third year in a row, the contest is divided into four different rounds with contestants divided into three teams.

Beyond that, the event now features big men, displaying the versatility that is in basketball right now. Before, while there was no rule that prohibited big men or wings from participating, these players didn't have those skills in their arsenal. However, again thanks to the evolution of the game, wings got good enough to be in the contest, and in 2016 it featured bigs for the first time, with DeMarcus Cousins, Anthony Davis, Draymond Green and Karl-Anthony Towns representing their position group. Not only did Towns win it all that same year, but bigs won four of the next six (including wings, five of the next six).

This point has added to the variety the contest had. Only three players have won multiple Skills Contests, none have won more than two, and only two have won them in back-to-back fashion. Dwyane Wade was the first, doing so in 2006 and 2007, while Damian Lillard did it in 2013 and 2014, the latter happening in a duo with Trey Burke the same weekend Lillard became the first player in NBA history to compete in all five main All-Star competitions (Rising Stars Game, all three competitions, All-Star Game). Steve Nash won two five years apart (2005 and 2010).

2024 NBA Skills Challenge

This season's competition will happen Saturday, Feb. 17 at 8 PM ET. at Lucas Oil Stadium, the home of the NFL's Indianapolis Colts. The complete breakdown of the rules, tiebreakers and everything else can be found here, but I'll give you the SparkNotes version: three teams of three players will participate in four rounds that test their ability to dribble, pass and shoot, with the winner of each earning varying amounts of "Challenge Points", with the winner being the team with the highest amount of them.

For this year's competition, round one will consist of a timed relay, round two is a passing challenge, round three is a contest of shot-making, and the fourth and final round consists of making a half-court shot.

Like every year since the shift to having teams, the location of All-Star Weekend will be represented with a team, this year's being Tyrese Haliburton, Bennedict Mathurin and Myles Turner to form "Team Pacers". Besides them, "Team Top Picks" will feature Paolo Banchero, Anthony Edwards and Victor Wembanyama, three of the last four No. 1 overall picks in the NBA Draft, and "Team All-Stars" consists of Scottie Barnes, Tyrese Maxey and Trae Young (hopefully Barnes and Maxey have a better outing than the last time they were in the competition.

Past winners

Since the shift to the team format, the team representing the location of All-Star Weekend has won back-to-back Skills Challenges. Will Team Pacers continue that streak in Indianapolis this Saturday?