Zion Williamson is a rising star and no one can deny that. He's one of the most dominant scorers in the paint and has yet to play a full season in the NBA, living up to the hype that surrounded him for years in high school and college.

However, it seems like the young power forward still needs to accomplish more in the league before getting that 'superstar treatment' from the referees, as the officials didn't blow the whistle when Nikola Jokic met him at the rim on a dunk attempt to tie the game with 2.2 seconds left to play.

Williamson is currently second in the league in free-throw attempts per game at 8.6, trailing only Joel Embiid. However, it seems like Jokic's status in the league prevailed this time, as he may have hit Zion on the head after blocking his shot.

"I did see the replay, and I saw exactly what you saw. (...) "He gets to the free throw line a lot, and I've had referees say to me, 'How many free throws has he shot?' and it's a stupid question. It doesn't matter. Call it every single time he gets fouled. That's all your job is." Pelicans coach Stan Van Gundy said, as quoted by ESPN.

Zion, however, didn't want to read that much into it, claiming that he's yet to earn the respect from the referees and needs to do more to get that treatment:

"I gotta earn my respect. I'm only in Year 2. Gotta get a couple more years under my belt and hopefully, things change with that," the former Duke Blue Devil said.

I think we can all agree that Zion has done an outstanding job of earning his respect around the league. He's averaging 26.8 points, 7.1 rebounds, and 3.6 assists per game on a whopping 61.6% from the field. So yeah, that superstar treatment is coming, young man.