Three-time defending dunk champ Mac McClung revealed he wouldn’t be participating in this year’s NBA dunk contest.
This year’s NBA All-Star weekend will be held in Los Angeles at the Intuit Dome, home of the Clippers. The traditional dunk contest is slated to take place on Saturday as part of the ASG festivities that will run from February 13-15.
But this year’s competition will not feature the defending champion.in this year’s contest. He will not seek a fourth consecutive title. McClung, currently with the Bulls’ G-League team, said he’s been preparing to go for another dunk contest title for the last few months but decided to take this year off. However, he will be sharing the dunks he prepared after the contest.the no-doubt winner of the last three dunk contests with some pretty awesome performances. But it will be nice to see a new dunker come for his crown. The dunk contest is nowhere near as popular as it once was and McClung’s absence won’t be changing that. But the more room for new blood the better for the NBA. The league may not be ecstatic about this news, though. Given the dunk contest’s unpopularity with current players the NBA probably figured it could, at the very least, rely on McClung to show up. But now the scramble begins to fill every spot. As of Sunday there hasn’t been a single confirmed participant for the 2026 slam dunk contest. Last year’s event featured only four contestants: McClung, Bulls wing Matas Buzelis, the Spurs’ future ROY, Stephon Castle, and Bucks wing Andre Jackson Jr. The latter three names figure to be candidates to participate again this year given their familiarity with the contest. But otherwise? There aren’t any obvious choices. Indeed, Sixers standout rookie VJ Edgecombe’s reaction suggests the NBA might have a tough time finding notable players willing to sign up. “I ain’t doing that,” Edgecombe bluntly responded when asked by reporters if he’d participate in the dunk contest last week. “Nah. I’m good.”A sad reality for the NBA and every fan with fond memories of electric dunk contests from the good old days.Liam McKeone is a senior writer for the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has been in the industry as a content creator since 2017, and prior to joining SI in May 2024, McKeone worked for NBC Sports Boston and The Big Lead. In addition to his work as a writer, he has hosted the Press Pass Podcast covering sports media and The Big Stream covering pop culture. A graduate of Fordham University, he is always up for a good debate and enjoys loudly arguing about sports, rap music, books and video games. McKeone has been a member of the National Sports Media Association since 2020.
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