NBA Slam Dunk Contest 2015: Participants, rules, TV schedule, start time and more

All-Star Saturday night is just hours away, which means the 2015 Sprite Slam Dunk Contest is right around the corner. The event has fallen off a bit over the past few years, but this year’s contest does have promise, as it will feature four young and on-the-rise players who have never participated in the dunk contest before.

LaVine is followed by Antetokounmpo (+225), who would become the first Buck, and international player, to win the title, and then Oladipo (+300). Plumlee is a distant fourth (+700), despite being a member of the hometown Nets. No Nets player has ever won the dunk contest.

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Antetokounmpo, Oladipo and Plumlee are all second-year players, while LaVine is a rookie. All four of them will be playing in the Rising Stars Challenge game the night before, which could turn out to be a dunk contest preview.

The league has also gone back to its old format after changing the rules for last year’s contest. This year there will be no division of conferences or anything like that. Instead the format will be a classic one: there will be two rounds and dunkers will have three chances and no time limit to complete each of their dunks. Dunkers will attempt two dunks in the first round, and the two contestants with highest combined scores (handed out by five judges on a scale of 6-10) will advance to the final, head-to-head round. There each player will again get two dunks, and the one with the highest combined score will be crowned champion.

The 2015 Slam Dunk Contest will be the final event in the All-Star Saturday Night festivities, which begin at 8 p.m. It will be televised by TNT. Below are all the details: