All-Star Starters: Who is missing?

On Thursday night, TNT’s Inside the NBA announced the All-Star Game starters this year. Some were known, some were assumed, and some were entirely left aside.

Beginning with the Western Conference, which has many faces who have been in the Western Conference starting lineup for the past decade, and even more.

Starting at guard for the Western Conference, Oklahoma City Thunder superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander comes in averaging 32 points, 6.1 assists and 5.3 rebounds along with two steals and a block per game shooting an astounding 53% from the field.

Being paired at guard with Gilgeous-Alexander is 10-time All-Star, two-time MVP, Stephen Curry who makes it to his 11th All-Star Game after averaging 22.6 points, five rebounds, and six assists along with garnering 2,342,126 votes from the fans.

This means that Luka Doncic will not be an All-Star starter and will most likely be a reserve after finishing third in the fan vote and sixth in the player vote.

Now to the Western Conference frontcourt, the starters are perennial All-NBA candidates, future first-ballot Hall of Famers, Lebron James, Kevin Durant, and Nikola Jokic.

This does mean that two players who have been absolutely dominant this season, Anthony Davis and Victor Wembanyama have been left out, but when you look at the weight of the names chosen over them it is very understandable. We will certainly see both of these premiere forwards at the All-Star Game.

Now over to the Eastern Conference starters, which was certainly a closer call than the Hall of Fame-studded Western Conference starters.

Starting at guard for the Eastern Conference, the leader of the No. 1 seed Cleveland Cavaliers, Donovan Mitchell, finished first in the player and media vote while finishing second in the fan vote.

The guard he will be paired with was not the person who finished first in the fan vote though, that being a notable omission, Hornets superstar Lamelo Ball received almost 2.5 million votes from the fans but was ranked as just the seventh best guard in the Eastern Conference behind people such as Darius Garland, Trae Young and Damian Lillard.

The other starter for the Eastern Conference guards is New York Knicks point guard Jalen Brunson who finished second in both media and player votes along with third place in the fan vote.

Finally, the Eastern Conference frontcourt starters are Bucks’ superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo, Celtics’ lead man Jayson Tatum and last but certainly not least the newcomer in the Eastern Conference, New York Knicks’ center Karl-Anthony Towns.

Karl-Anthony Towns and Jalen Brunson become the first Knicks duo since Clyde Frazier and Earl Monroe in 1975 to start in the All-Star game together.

Many of the names who you would expect to see here, or be surprised to not see, such as Lamelo Ball, will most likely make their appearance in San Francisco alongside these ten superstars.

Massimo Manfra is a first-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email mgm6116@psu.edu.