Despite pulling out victory, Rockets nearly robbed by some bizarre calls late
FRIDAY, JANUARY 1, 2010 8:59 AM CST
By Clutch
Copyright 2010 ClutchFans.net
If you've ever wondered if the NBA officiates games "differently" in the final minute, look no further than the Rockets-Mavericks game Thursday night for your evidence.
The Rockets won this game, so this is not a disgruntled fan of the losing team dishing out sour grapes. This was an embarrassment for the NBA as the league's three-man crew of Bob Delaney, Jason Phillips and Mark Lindsay were about as clueless late as Stromile Swift at a basketball fundamentals summer camp.
As broadcaster and former Rockets great Clyde Drexler put it bluntly, "This is a terrible crew." It would be an injustice if we didn't go back and look at the final 1:03 of this game.
There were four head-scratching calls (or no-calls) during that stretch and three of them came against the Rockets.
With just over a minute to go and the Rockets up 6, Mavericks forward Josh Howard tried to blow past Shane Battier for an easy deuce. Battier recovered and cleanly blocked Howard's drive, but strangely the whistle blew.
19 seconds later, Battier was in hot pursuit of a loose ball rebound and appeared to be pushed in the back out of bounds by Dirk Nowitzki. Battier was outraged, letting the refs know he was pushed, and Delaney quickly T'ed him up, cutting Houston's lead to 3 with 44 seconds left.
11 seconds after that, the officials appear to pull a makeup call. Jason Terry drives and gets hit in the head by Carl Landry. No whistle.
Then came the coup de grâce. Holding the ball with a 3-point lead, the Rockets turn to Aaron Brooks, who dribbled out most of the clock and isolated against Shawn Marion. Brooks found a seam, took it strong to the hole and went for the lefty layup with 8 seconds left in the game. The replay clearly showed Nowitzki hammered Brooks' arm. Not the hand or the wrist -- he clobbered the bicep.
How in the world could three (presumably) trained NBA officials, each standing in a different spot and zeroing in on an isolation play, miss this? The short answer is they didn't. It was just a clear example of how NBA referees collectively swallow the whistle for non-superstars in the closing seconds of a tight game.
I think this screencap gives you a good visual.
I can't add much more... the tape below is pretty clear. Thankfully Jason Kidd missed that three in the end that would have tied it or all hell would have broken loose at ClutchFans.
