NBA Has Officially Changed The Format For 2025 All-Star Game

Back in November, ESPN insider Shams Charania reported that changes were coming to the NBA's format for the 2025 All-Star Game. Well, he wasn't kidding. 

On Tuesday afternoon, the NBA and NBA Players Association announced that they're debuting a tournament-style format at this season's All-Star Game in the Bay Area. The 2025 All-Star Game will feature a mini-tournament that consists of four teams and three games. There'll be two semifinal matchups that eventually lead to a showdown between the two winners. The structure for this tournament will be a bit different from a normal NBA game. For starters, the winner will be decided by which team reaches or surpasses 40 points first. 

As for how the rosters will be constructed, the NBA is letting Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith put on their GM caps. They'll each get to pick eight players for their respective teams. 

The fourth team, meanwhile, will feature the winning players from the Castrol Rising Stars showcase. That means the final team will consist of rookies, second-year players and G League standouts. 

Here's more from the NBA: 

The four NBA All-Star Game head coaches will come from the coaching staffs of the teams with the best regular-season record in each conference through games played on Sunday, Feb. 2. The head coach of the leading Eastern Conference team and the head coach of the leading Western Conference team will each coach an NBA All-Star team. An assistant coach from one of those staffs will serve as head coach of the Castrol Rising Stars champion, and an assistant coach from the other staff will coach the remaining All-Star team.  

The four teams in the All-Star Game will compete for a prize pool of $1.8 million. Each player on the winning team will land a nice $125,000 bonus.