TORONTO - Only days after hitting a record-high temperature for February at nearly 16-degrees Celsius, Toronto plunged to -25 on Saturday morning for its coldest day in over 20 years.

Naturally, the cold snap had to coincide with the NBA’s All-Star Weekend and Toronto Raptors guard DeMar DeRozan is having a tough time convincing his fellow All-Stars that this frigid weather isn’t par for the course.

“Nobody believes me,” DeRozan said to TSN.ca. “They think it just be cold like this all summer, but that’s not the truth.  You’ve got to take the good with the bad. You’ve got All-Star Weekend here – everything.”

For some players who ply their trades in cold-weather cities, the temperatures in Toronto this weekend are even a bit too much.

“This is something different,” Detroit Pistons centre Andre Drummond said with a laugh. “Yeah, this is bad. Nobody is happy about it. For me, it’s a hassle to go outside to even get some food, but you can’t allow weather to stop your playing. You’ve just got to prepare yourself for whatever’s out there.”

But for one All-Star, cold weather in Toronto evokes a fond cherished remembrance.

“My rookie year, we came here and there was a huge snowstorm,” Oklahoma City Thunder superstar Kevin Durant told TSN.ca. “I got caught outside in the snow. That’s one of my all-time fondest memories of being in Toronto. I come every summer and just hang out for a couple of days. It’s an amazing city, man. It reminds me a lot of being in New York City. It’s great being here.”

TRADING PLACES?

With the NBA trade deadline looming, gossip is flying apace with the likes of Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Love and Dwight Howard’s names being bandied about in recent days.

Still, players are hoping All-Star Weekend is an escape from what will probably never get past the rumour stage.

“Nobody has talked about it here that I know of,” New Orleans Pelicans centre Anthony Davis told TSN.ca of the impending deadline. “A lot of these teams probably won’t make any trades because they’re doing so well, but it’s nothing I talk about. I can’t speak for anybody else.”

Atlanta Hawks power forward Paul Millsap, whose teammates Jeff Teague and Al Horford have come up in the rumour mill over the past week, says gossip is just par for the course at this time of the season.

“Here we go again,” said Millsap. “It’s that time of year. You can’t let that affect your play or what the team is doing. What’s going to happen is going to happen, regardless, so you’ve just got to stay focused. I think our team is a focused group and we’re not going to let some talk deter us from what we’re trying to do.”

For players of Davis’s stature, significant personnel moves won’t come as a surprise. With the Pelicans signing him to a five-year, $122 million extension last summer, Davis is very much a part of the process in New Orleans. But Davis says he won’t overstep his bounds.

“I talk to the organization and whatever they decide to do, I make sure I’m involved in it,” said Davis. “But I don’t go out and say, ‘Do this or do that.’ I try to let them convene and then come to me and we all sit down collectively and figure out what’s the best move.”

The trade deadline is set for Friday at 3pm Eastern.

‘T-WOLVES SHOW’

With Andrew Wiggins returning to Toronto for the Rising Stars Challenge on Friday, Zach LaVine defending his Slam Dunk title on Saturday night and Karl-Anthony Towns winning the Skills Challenge, All-Star Weekend has taken on a Minnesota feel.

“It’s very much a T-Wolves show,” Towns told TSN.ca, “especially when you got Zach and Andrew Wiggins in his hometown. This is awesome.”

The first-overall pick last summer out of Kentucky, Towns is excelling in his rookie season. Towns is averaging 17.1 points and 10.1 boards a game in over 30 minutes a night. He’s collected the NBA Rookie of the Month award for the Western Conference for the first three months of the season, spurring talk that he could follow in Wiggins’s footsteps and claim the yearly award.

But that’s not something that’s interesting the Edison, New Jersey native just yet.

“I’m not worried about that,” said Towns. “I’m more worried about being the best player I can be for my team.”

With himself and Wiggins burgeoning superstars for the team, Towns credits the return of the Timberwolves’ first megastar in Kevin Garnett. The Big Ticket is back for his first full season with the team, his 20th in the NBA, after coming back from the Brooklyn Nets at last year’s trade deadline.

“It’s amazing,” Towns said of playing with Garnett. “He’s a great mentor and a Hall of Famer. It’s just awesome.”

If there is one thing that Towns has learned quickly for himself from the pro game, it’s the gift of slowing things down.

“It’s really just taking my time,” Towns said of his adjustment. “Just being patient - being patient on the court. When I’m patient, I’m going to succeed a lot more.”