NBA ALL STAR

March 7, 2021

Chris Paul

Team LeBron

Press Conference

Team LeBron 170, Team Durant 150

Q. That lob, not the pass that you inbounded which I've seen you do, but catching the lob is a different story. Take us through that. Was that planned before it happened or was that spontaneous?

CHRIS PAUL: No, we talked about it. We said all three of us wanted to get a dunk in the course of the game, so we just went ahead and did it back to back to back.

Q. What was it like tonight? Obviously the new format helps the competitive part of it, but it seemed like you guys just had more fun tonight. Am I reading that wrong or not?

CHRIS PAUL: Yeah, I don't know. You know, shoutout to my brother the late Kobe Bryant. I only know one way to play, and that's to win, so we kept talking about it throughout the game. Everybody wanted to stay healthy, but we wanted to win. So we competed and we won.

Q. Can you just take us through the weekend for you and how much you enjoyed the event and everything that it represented?

CHRIS PAUL: Big shoutout to everybody that made this happen, to the players for coming down and participating, playing. There's always a lot of back and forth on these different decisions, but once guys get here, I think they're grateful for it. But now with the short break, quick turnaround. I'm about to fly to L.A. so I can see my family. Time is short, but I've got to go see the crew.

Q. I don't know if anyone made you aware before or after the fact, but you're now the all-time assist leader in All-Star Game history.

CHRIS PAUL: Man, the way I knew how many assists I needed to break it was my son. My son came up to me at halftime and said, Dad, you need four more assists. To have my dad, my brother, my nephew here for it makes it that much more special. My dad is the man who introduced me to the game, the man who taught me how to be a man, the man who taught me about discipline. For him to be here to see it, there's nothing better than that.

Q. Just the amount of money you helped raise for HBCUs. I know it's a cause close to your heart. What's it mean to be a part of that?

CHRIS PAUL: Oh, man, it's something that's memorable, something we'll never forget. All of us players, we talked about it during the initial shutdown. We talked about it during the bubble. To see all this come together through this cause, you see my jacket here with all the different HBCUs represented, so I'm just happy to be a part of it.