The original high flyer, “Dr J” Julius Erving’s amazing free throw line dunk during the 1976 ABA All Star Game is so legendary that very few have ever come close to duplicating this legendary feat.
Many have tried, but essentially only “His Airness” Michael Jordan came the closest to duplicating Erving’s original FT line jam, when during the 1988 Slam Dunk Contest, MJ took off from just behind the charity stripe, to defeat Dominique Wilkins in arguably one of the greatest dunk contests of all time.
The dunk is so difficult that even some of today’s most athletic NBA players will not even attempt the legendary jaunt, except if you count Javale McGee’s humorous dunk fails from the FT line a few seasons ago.
Enter previously unheralded high schooler Shelby McEwen from Oxford, MS, who took home a dunk contest victory over the entire field at the most recent Jordan Brand First To Fly event in Las Vegas by clearly taking off from behind the FT line to put his name on the map.
McEwen does not appear in ESPN’s Top 100 player rankings for the Class of 2015, but that may soon change, following showing off some amazing hops to win the dunk contest.
Check out the video evidence….
Allen Moll has been a lifelong NBA and NCAA College Basketball fan who watches and studies games religiously, and coaches youth basketball in his native Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. Allen has also provided content to Bleacherreport.com, Upperdeckblog.com, Cleveland.com, CSN Philly.com, Buckets Magazine, in addition to being a tenured NBA and NCAA columnist for TheHoopDoctors.com.
