Golden State Warriors and their fans were fuming at two major missed calls during the last two minutes of their big game against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Christmas Day. In the league two minute report, it shows that the Cavs indeed benefitted from two missed calls in their 109-108 win over the Warriors.
According to the league, Richard Jefferson should have been called for a foul with 3.1 seconds left for making foot contact with the Warriors’ Kevin Durant that was determined to have affected Durant’s rhythm, speed, balance or quickness on the play.
The game ended with Durant missing a 34-foot 3-point attempt from the floor as time expired.
“I fell,” Durant said. “And I didn’t fall on my own.”
Durant later told The Undefeated, “I would’ve made that shot if he didn’t trip me up. … But they ain’t calling it on him at their crib. It’s not his fault. It’s not the refs’ fault, either.”
“We all think we’re fouled on every play in every single game,” Jefferson said. “That’s why I say I know the referees have a very hard job. I switched to his body. It looked like he lost his balance. He was trying to regain his balance, and as soon as I saw him start to stumble, I ran off. I ran off so it wouldn’t look like I was trying to pressure him more, so he didn’t trip on my foot and it looked like I bumped him — nothing.
“It’s one of those things; plays can go either way. … When you get down to these two quality teams, each play back and forth, everything can be dissected. It’s just one of those things that went in our favor at the last play.”
“There’s a lot of fouls throughout the course of the game that don’t get called,” Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue said when asked for comment on the league’s determination. “It’s a tough game to officiate — the players we have, the way guys can draw fouls and contact. And so that was an incidental play at the end of the game.
“You don’t want the game decided on two free throws at the end of the game. I didn’t see [the foul]. There wasn’t much contact to me. But to me, you come back and say that you made a mistake in the last two minutes of the game, I mean, that’s on them.”
The league also determined that LeBron James’ dunk with 1:43 remaining, which put the Cavs up 105-103 and gave them their first lead since the first quarter, should have resulted in a technical foul for “deliberately hanging on the rim” after the dunk was completed.
James said after the game he had extra motivation to finish the dunk over Draymond Green because Green fouled him and sent him sprawling to the floor in a similar circumstance in Game 7 of the NBA Finals in June.
source: ESPN
RT @anthonyVslater: KD on the final play: “I fell. And I didn’t fall on my own.” pic.twitter.com/oThwxHgZ3f
— Shaina Auxilly (@Shay_Marie) December 25, 2016
