By Antonis Stroggylakis/ info@eurohoops.net
The Turkish Basketball League celebrated its 50h year not only with a brand new name, being now known as “Basketball Super League” but also with a spectacular All Star Game. Under a new CEO, Turkish basketball legend Hidayet Turkoglu, the show that the Federation prepared was absolutely spectacular and its contests made headliners all over Europe, and not only. It goes without saying that the TBF wants the Turkish league to become the absolute best in the continent.
We certainly enjoyed the festivities, as perhaps you did as well. Here are 10 facts that you probably did not know about the Turkish All Star Game that took place in Istanbul during the previous Weekend.
- The crowd’s absolute favorite for the All Star Game could not participate in the show! Jan Vesely won the voting with over 52 thousand (!) votes, but, unfortunately, his back injury two days before the game prevented him from any action. He belonged in the “Team Asia” All Star squad.
- The most popular Turkish player was… strong with the Force. Jedi knight Cedi Osman received 34 thousand votes, more than anyone in the “Team Europe” All Star squad.
- Of course, not everyone likes a Jedi. The ruthless Sith lord Furkman “Darth Vader” Korkmaz won the slam dunk contest empowered by a special suit. Korkmaz paid homage to notorious dunker Conrad McRae who suddenly passed away during practice at age 29. McRae had played in Anadolu Efes during the 1995-1996 season.
- At least one player from each team participated in the All Star Game or the contests. Unfortunately, Kalin Lucas of Ronesans TED Kolejliler could not make it to the skills contest because of an unexpected injury.
- 19 year old superprospect Berk Ugurlu won the Leaseplan Skills Challenge beating Kartal Omzirak. Ugurlu was faster than anyone passing the challenges in 39 seconds during the first round and 31 seconds in the final round. He has some skills, doesn’t he?
- 840 thousand unique votes decided the starters of the All Star Game. That’s more than double than the people who voted last year (400 thousand).
- The game has also been a raving success in the Turkish social media, and not only. The related tag ##BSLAllStar2016 was at the top the Turkish Twitter for more than 7 hours and had more than 40 million interactions.
- The game was sold out (naturally) and many Turkish celebrities enjoyed it from the arena. That massively helped to increase its popularity. It makes you wonder what records will be broken next year.
- A fan won a trip to New York by making a half court shot. That was amazing, as were some players’ reactions (Maciej Lampe, Kenny Gabriel Kenan Sipahi)
10. The Turkish federation organized a video contest with the hasthtag #AllStarHareketim (something like #MyAllStarMove).
The winner would win a trip to the All Star Game and the chance to enjoy the show from the courtside. Ahmet Yelken a teacher in small village near the city of Manisa won the contest. You can watch for yourself what made his video unique and moving to the people of the Federation: