NBA tweaks All-Star game format to pay tribute to Kobe Bryant

The National Basketball Association (NBA) has tweaked the format of the All-Star game to pay tribute to Kobe Bryant.

The change includes a new fourth-quarter format. Further additional plans to honour Bryant during NBA All-Star 2020 in Chicago will be announced at a later date.

NBA has decided to turn every quarter of the All-Star game into an abbreviated contest and the score will be adjusted to zero at the start of the second and third quarters.

The scores will then be restored at the beginning of the fourth quarter as the tribute to Kobe Bryant begins.

At the beginning of the fourth quarter, the game clock will be turned off and a final target score will be set.

The final target score will be determined by taking the leading team's total cumulative score through three quarters and adding 24 points - the 24 representing Bryant's jersey number for the final ten seasons of his NBA career.

The teams will then play an untimed fourth quarter and the first team to reach the final target score will win the NBA All-Star Game.

Bryant, 41, and his 13-year old daughter Gianna were among the nine people killed when a helicopter they were traveling in crashed amid foggy conditions and burst into flames in the hills above Calabasas.

The basketball legend had won five National Basketball Association (NBA) championships in his 20-year-long career while playing for Los Angeles Lakers.

Hollywood artists including Snoop Dogg, Meek Mill, Justin Bieber, Usher, 2 Chainz want the National Basketball Association (NBA) to change their logo to honour Kobe Bryant.

Billboard reported that the NBA has discussed numerous ways of celebrating Kobe's legacy, one of the major changes they have in mind is switching the NBA's longtime logo from Jerry West to a silhouette of the Black Mamba.

( With inputs from ANI )