NBA All-Star Game
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50 free NBA All-Star Game trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The NBA All-Star Game began as a gamble: a one-off exhibition staged to win back fans after a college betting scandal. It turned into the sport's midseason party, the weekend when the best in the world share one floor, scoring records fall, and a single dunk can make a reputation. This quiz covers the whole story. There are questions on the game's MVPs and the nights that earned them the trophy, on the starters and the fan-vote leaders who caused a stir, on the 2017 and 2018 games and the switch to drafted rosters, and on the cities and arenas that have hosted. All-Star Saturday gets its share too, with the dunk contest, the three-point shootout and the celebrity game. It is written for fans who watch every February and want to test their memory, and for quiz hosts who need accurate questions with answers. Every question comes with a short explanation, so a wrong guess still leaves you with a good story.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which NFL venue hosted the 2010 NBA All-Star Game before a record basketball crowd of 108,713?
Cowboys Stadium
Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, smashed the old mark of 78,129, set when Michigan State played Kentucky at Ford Field in 2003.
Q 02Which Lakers guard won MVP of the 1992 NBA All-Star Game months after retiring with HIV?
Magic Johnson
Magic Johnson was voted in by fans despite having retired, then scored a game-high 25 points. After he hit a three-pointer, players ran on to embrace him and the last 14.5 seconds were never played.
Q 03Which pop singer's jazzy national anthem at the 2018 NBA All-Star Game was widely mocked online?
Fergie
Fergie said the next day that she had wanted to try something special for the NBA, but that it missed the tone she intended.
Q 04Which city took over the 2017 NBA All-Star Game when it was pulled from Charlotte over a state law?
New Orleans
New Orleans stepped in for its second game in four seasons, having also hosted in 2014. Charlotte got the event back in 2019 after parts of North Carolina's 'bathroom bill' were repealed.
Q 05Which Motown star sang a soulful national anthem over a drum machine at the 1983 NBA All-Star Game?
Marvin Gaye
Marvin Gaye's slow-grooving version, sung at the Forum in Inglewood, California, was one of his last televised appearances.
Q 06Which Houston rookie out-polled a three-time Finals MVP to start the 2003 NBA All-Star Game?
Yao Ming
Yao Ming finished nearly a quarter of a million votes ahead of the Lakers center, in the first year the league offered ballots in Chinese as well as English and Spanish.
Q 07Which retiring legend was handed Vince Carter's starting spot at the 2003 NBA All-Star Game?
Michael Jordan
Michael Jordan had turned down the same offer from two other East starters before accepting Carter's at the last minute. It was his 14th and final All-Star selection.
Q 08What did Blake Griffin leap over for the dunk that won him the 2011 NBA Slam Dunk Contest?
A car
A car was his prop: he dunked over the hood of a Kia sedan in Los Angeles. He was a rookie that season, and an All-Star too.
Q 09Which Atlanta Hawks guard beat teammate Dominique Wilkins to win the 1986 NBA Slam Dunk Contest?
Spud Webb
Spud Webb, the shortest man ever to enter, surprised even Wilkins, the defending champion, who had never seen him dunk. He closed with two perfect 50-point scores.
Q 10Which four-time winner had the NBA All-Star Game MVP award renamed in his honor in February 2020?
Kobe Bryant
Kobe Bryant had died in a helicopter crash three weeks before the 2020 game. Commissioner Adam Silver announced the change during that All-Star weekend in Chicago.
Q 11Which captain won MVP of the 2018 NBA All-Star Game, the first played with rosters picked by draft?
LeBron James
LeBron James took the award for the third time, 12 years after becoming its youngest winner at 21. His side edged the other captain's team 148–145 in Los Angeles.
Q 12Which Pelicans star's 52 points in the 2017 NBA All-Star Game broke a 55-year-old scoring record?
Anthony Davis
Anthony Davis added 10 rebounds and took home the MVP trophy. Wilt Chamberlain's old mark of 42 points had stood since 1962.
Q 13Which Golden State guard hit a record 16 three-pointers in the 2022 NBA All-Star Game?
Stephen Curry
Q 21Which city staged the first NBA All-Star Game in 1951 after its team owner offered to cover losses?
Boston
Boston drew 10,094 fans to the Garden, nearly three times the league's average crowd that season, and the one-off experiment became an annual fixture.
Q 22Which city hosted the 2016 NBA All-Star Game, the first one played outside the United States?
Toronto
Toronto staged it at the Air Canada Centre, home of the Raptors, after years of planning aimed at growing basketball in Canada.
Q 23Which city hosted the 2007 NBA All-Star Game despite having no NBA team of its own?
Las Vegas
Las Vegas put the game in a university arena, which also made it the first All-Star Game played on a college campus.
Stephen Curry made 48 of his 50 points from long range and fell two short of the game's scoring record. He also set new marks for threes in a quarter and in a half.
Q 14Which Celtics forward set an NBA All-Star Game scoring record with 55 points in 2023?
Jayson Tatum
Jayson Tatum beat the previous best of 52, set six years earlier, and took home the MVP trophy.
Q 152021 NBA All-Star Game MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, who made all 16 shots, was born in which country?
Greece
Greece is where he was born, in Athens, to parents who had emigrated from Nigeria. He scored 35 points without a miss and became the first non-American to win the game's MVP award.
Q 16Which Oklahoma City guard won back-to-back NBA All-Star Game MVP awards in 2015 and 2016?
Russell Westbrook
Russell Westbrook scored 41 points in the 2015 game, one shy of a record that had stood since 1962, then repeated a year later in a 196–173 win.
Q 17Which 76ers guard rallied the East from 21 points down to win the 2001 NBA All-Star Game by one?
Allen Iverson
Allen Iverson scored 15 of his 25 points in the final nine minutes in Washington, D.C. The winning three-pointer came from Stephon Marbury with 28 seconds left.
Q 18Which Timberwolves forward was MVP of the 2003 NBA All-Star Game, decided in double overtime?
Kevin Garnett
Kevin Garnett scored 37 points with nine rebounds and five steals as the West won 155–145 in Atlanta. No All-Star Game before it had needed a second extra period.
Q 19Which center shared the NBA All-Star Game MVP award with a co-winner in both 2000 and 2009?
Shaquille O'Neal
Shaquille O'Neal split the 2000 award with Tim Duncan, won it outright in 2004, and was the first player to win it with more than one team.
Q 20Which Cavaliers guard, born in Melbourne, Australia, was MVP of the 2014 NBA All-Star Game?
Kyrie Irving
Kyrie Irving had 31 points and 14 assists for the East. His American parents brought him back to the United States when he was two years old.
Q 24Why was the 1999 NBA All-Star Game, scheduled for Philadelphia, never played?
A league lockout
A league lockout ran from July 1998 to January 1999 and cut the season to 50 games per team, leaving no room for the midseason showcase.
Q 25Which sport's All-Star Game did NBA publicist Haskell Cohen copy when proposing one in 1951?
Baseball
Baseball's version was the model, and the league badly needed good news: college basketball had just been rocked by a point-shaving scandal.
Q 26Which Lakers coach's run of eight All-Star Games in nine seasons led to a rule against repeats?
Pat Riley
Pat Riley kept earning the West job between 1982 and 1990 because his team kept posting the conference's best record. Under the 'Riley Rule', the next-best team's coach steps in instead.
Q 27Since 2017, which two groups have shared the vote with fans to pick NBA All-Star Game starters?
Players and media
Players and media each hold a quarter of the vote, with fans keeping half. Before 2017 the starting fives were chosen by fan ballots alone.
Q 28Which Mavericks center fell 14,227 fan votes short of starting the 2016 NBA All-Star Game?
Zaza Pachulia
Zaza Pachulia, a Georgian big man in his first season in Dallas, nearly knocked a San Antonio forward out of the West's starting five.
Q 29The 2020 NBA All-Star Game's untimed fourth quarter, played to a target score, used which format?
Elam Ending
Elam Ending takes its name from Nick Elam, a Ball State professor who wanted to stop late-game stalling and deliberate fouling. It was first used by The Basketball Tournament in 2017.
Q 30What did NBA players win by threatening to strike before the televised 1964 All-Star Game?
Recognition of their union
Recognition of their union came because the owners feared ABC would walk away if its first All-Star broadcast was scrapped. A historic blizzard was raging outside the arena.