Mickey Mouse and friends are teaming up with the NBA for a special Christmas Day event.
Dunk the Halls — an animated alternate broadcast of the San Antonio Spurs-New York Knicks game — will air on ESPN2 and stream on Disney+ and ESPN+ (with subscription).
Although the actual game will take place at Madison Square Garden, the first real-time animated NBA game will take place on “Main Street, USA” at Walt Disney World, thanks to Mickey's Christmas wish to Santa.
At halftime, Mickey and other Disney characters will participate in a special dunk contest.
Here's what you need to know:
Quoi : “Dunk the Halls”
Who : Spurs vs. Knicks
When : Wednesday December 25, 2024
Or : Walt Disney World
Hour : 12 p.m. (Eastern Time)
Television : ESPN2
Streaming and direct : DirecTV Stream (free trial), fuboTV (free trial), Disney+ (with subscription), ESPN+ (with subscription)
NEW YORK (AP) — There's a Christmas Day Basketball game at Walt Disney World, featuring Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, and Victor Wembanyama.
A lively match, indeed.
The real game will take place at Madison Square Garden, where Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs will face the New York Knicks, broadcast on ABC and ESPN and streaming on Disney+ and ESPN+.
Madison Square Garden is a must-see on the NBA Christmas schedule. It now comes with an even more festive setting, as the “Dunk the Halls” game will be hosted at Disney, on a field set up where many families have photographed themselves during their vacations.
Why this place? Because that was Mickey Mouse's Christmas wish.
“Basketball courts often have the ability to make a normal environment special, but at Disney it can only become incredible,” Wembanyama said in an ESPN video promoting his first Christmas.
The story — this is Disney, after all — begins with Mickey writing a letter to Santa, asking if he and his friends could have a basketball game. Not only will they have the opportunity to watch a game with NBA players, but some of them will play as well. Goofy and Donald Duck will replace some Knicks players, while Mickey and Minnie Mouse will join the Spurs team.
“It seems to me that Goofy and Jalen Brunson have a very good pick-and-roll at the elite level,” said Phil Orlins, vice president of production at ESPN.
Walt Disney World already hosted real NBA games in 2020, when the league moved there to finish the season suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The setting for the Christmas game will be Main Street USA, at the entrance to the Magic Kingdom. Viewers will recognize Cinderella Castle behind one end line and the train station at the other end, and perhaps a few shops they visited in between.
Previous alternate animated broadcasts included an NFL game set in Andy's bedroom from “Toy Story”; the “NHL Big City Greens Classic” during a game between the Washington Capitals and the New York Rangers; and earlier this month, another NFL matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Dallas Cowboys in Springfield, as part of “The Simpsons Funday Football.”
Unlike basketball, players in these sports wear helmets. So, this broadcast required an additional level of detail and increased cooperation with players and teams to recreate the exact appearance of their faces and hairstyles.
“So we've achieved a level of detail that we've never done in any other broadcast,” said David Sparrgrove, senior director of creative animation at ESPN.
Wembanyama, the 2.21-meter phenom from France and the latest Rookie of the Year winner, looks huge even among other NBA players. The creators of the alternative broadcast had to design his appearance not only among teammates and opponents, but also among mice, ducks and squirrels.
“Victor Wembanyama, seeing him in person is crazy. “It's like seeing an alien descend on a basketball court, and we tried to capture that in his animated character,” said Drew Carter, who will once again handle commentary, as he did in previous lively broadcasts, receiving assistance from field reporter, Daisy Duck.
Wembanyama's presence is one reason why the Spurs-Knicks game, the first of a five-game NBA Christmas Day series, was an obvious choice for this lively broadcast. Kicking off at noon EST means it will begin in the evening in France, which should appeal to viewers there. Additionally, this follows the broadcast of the “Disney Parks Magical Christmas Day Parade” for the previous two hours, providing more time to promote the broadcast.
Recognizing that some viewers who switch to the animated game next may be Disney experts but new to the NBA, there will be 10 educational explanations to help them with basketball lingo and rules.
Sony's Beyond Sports visualization technology and Hawk-Eye tracking will allow animated players to perform the same movements and actions performed moments earlier by real MSG counterparts. Carter and analyst Monica McNutt will also be animated in broadcast style, wearing VR headsets to experience the match from Main Street, USA.
Other animated faces recognizable to some viewers include NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, who will judge a halftime dunk contest between Mickey and his friends, and Santa himself, who will operate the “SkyCam” ESPN during the match.
Players wonder how the production — and themselves — will appear.
“It's going to be so crazy to see the game lively,” Spurs veteran Chris Paul said. “I think what's great is it will give the kids another opportunity to watch a game and see us, pretty much, as characters.”
(Original article written by: Associated Press)
This event promises to offer a unique experience, uniting the world of sport and entertainment. How fans interact with this format could well influence the future of sports broadcasts. What other innovations could be implemented to enrich the spectator experience?
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