NBA All-Star-Weekend 2009

It's a good thing that Oklahoma City's Kevin Durant has a 7-foot-5-inch wingspan, because he had eight other second-year players and a six-game winning streak to take under his wing in the T-Mobile Rookie Challenge.

Durant scored a Rookie Challenge record 46 points on 17-for-25 shooting and was named MVP as he almost single-handedly sent the Sophomores to a 122-116 win at the U.S. Airways Center on Friday.

Last June, Derrick Rose was the first player selected in the 2008 Draft. On All-Star Saturday Night, Rose was first again.

Finishing off his winning time of 35.3 seconds with an emphatic double-pump reverse dunk, the Chicago Bulls guard became the first rookie to win the PlayStation Skills Challenge when he defeated New Jersey's Devin Harris in the championship round.

"It means a lot," Rose said of the win. "I'm a part of history with some of the greatest players in the league that have won this award."

Rose, who leads all rookies with 6.3 assists per game, finished the course 4.4 seconds faster than the Nets' point guard did.

Rose also breezed through his first round with a time of 33.3 seconds, 3.3 seconds ahead of Harris, 4.2 seconds ahead of Cleveland's Mo Williams and nearly a quarter of a minute faster than San Antonio's Tony Parker's 50.8 seconds. The Spurs' point guard now holds the dubious distinction of having the two slowest times ever recorded in Skills Challenge history. In 2003, Parker finished the course in 45.5 seconds.

Rose, however, made his two runs look easy, never using more than two attempts at any station in either round. He admitted, however, one station proved to be a little nerve-wracking.