The first United States versus the Rest of the World NBA All-Star Game will be played Sunday at the Intuit Dome, the third new concept since 2018 the league has used in an attempt to increase interest in the event.
The game will be a three-team round-robin tournament consisting of four 12-minute games, with two teams of U.S. players and one of foreign players.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said this format is “something many people have been asking for for a long time.”
“We’re sandwiched in the middle of the Olympics now, so it seemed like the appropriate time to try this new format,” Silver said Saturday at his customary All-Star Game news conference.
In the round-robin portion, each of the three teams will play one game against each of the other two teams. The top two teams based on round-robin play will play in the championship game. The first tiebreaker is point differential, followed by total points. If a tie still exists, it will be broken by random drawing.
The eight-player USA Stripes team includes Lakers forward LeBron James, the 22nd time in his 23-season NBA career he has been chosen for the game. The only time he was not selected was during his rookie season, 2003-04.
James’ 21-season streak of being voted as a starter ended when he finished ninth in the Western Conference in voting of fans, media and players. The top five were selected as starters.
James missed the Lakers’ first 14 games of the season because of sciatica, which affects the lower back and the side of the body. James was selected as a starter for last year’s All-Star Game but announced about 90 minutes before the start of play he would be unable to play because of foot and ankle discomfort.
Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard was also assigned to the USA Stripes team. He was added to the U.S. player pool by Silver to fulfill the 16-player minimum required by the format.
This is the seventh All-Star Game selection for Leonard, who was the game’s MVP in 2020. The 34-year-old former standout at Martin Luther King High School in Riverside and San Diego State is averaging a career-high 27.9 points per game.
Lakers guard Luka Doncic will be among the starters for the World team, which will face the USA Stars in the first 12-minute game. He will be facing James’ USA Stripes team in the second game, if the World team wins Game 1, or the third game if it loses Game 1.
This will be Doncic’s sixth All-Star Game in his eight-season NBA career, and his fifth as a starter.
Three players selected as starters are unable to play because of injuries — Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo and Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who both world have played for the World team, and Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry, who would have played for the Stripes team.
After the first 66 NBA All-Star Games were played in an East vs. West format, the first change to the format came with the 2018 game where the players for each team were selected by the top vote-getter in each conference.
The East vs. West format returned in 2024. The 2025 All-Star Game consisted of a four-team single-elimination tournament with three teams drafted from a pool of 24 all-stars by TNT analysts Shaquille O’Neal, Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley. The fourth team was the winner of the Rising Stars Challenge tournament.
Each player on the winning team will receive $125,000, with the members of the second-place team receiving $50,000 and the third-place team $25,000.
This is the record seventh time the All-Star Game will be played in the Los Angeles area and fourth since 2004. It was played at the since-demolished Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena in 1963, the Forum in 1972 and 1983 and what is now Crypto.com Arena in 2004, 2011 and 2018.
New York City is second with five — three at the since-demolished Madison Square Garden on Eighth Avenue and two at the current arena.
The game will be broadcast by NBC for the first time since 2002 and be streamed by Peacock. The game is being shifted from prime time to the afternoon because of NBC’s Olympics commitment with the telecast beginning at 2 p.m.