"Word spread Saturday morning that something special was going to happen. Blake Griffin was going to dunk over a car, and it was going to be awesome.

Even the early-morning spoiler didn't detract from the sheer theater of the moment. The Clippers' rookie sensation stood near half court with a full gospel choir singing "I Believe I Can Fly" while teammate Baron Davis popped out of the sunroof of a Kia with a basketball in his hand.

With most of the Staples Center crowd on its feet, Griffin took off toward the vehicle, jumped over the hood, caught a pass from Davis and slammed home the dunk that won him the NBA Slam Dunk Contest.

"When they first came to me with the dunk contest idea, they said there were no rules. I was like, 'So I can jump over a car?' - kind of playing around," Griffin said. "He was like, 'Yeah.' And I was like, 'Oh, maybe I have to do it now.'"

Griffin defeated the Washington Wizards' JaVale McGee, receiving 68 percent of the fans' votes.

"That was pretty (a) close (vote) considering he jumped over a car," McGee said. "... Nothing is going to beat the car unless I bring a plane out or something."

After struggling to do something truly spectacular in the first round, Griffin began the finals by throwing the ball off the backboard, catching it and dunking it through with one hand, putting his hand to his elbow through the rim. Compared to the rest of the night, that dunk was pedestrian in terms of theatrics.

Oklahoma City's Serge Ibaka had a young fan run out onto the court looking for a lost toy. The toy happened to be hanging off the front of the rim. Ibaka, who is from the Congo, dunked the ball and grabbed the toy with his mouth, trumping his first dunk where he took off from the free-throw line while a number of women held up NBA Africa flags."