The 3rd game of this very exciting series last night ended dramatically once again. The Cavs held a huge lead for most of the game with James and Dellavedova leading the way, but the Warriors slowly started to will their way back into the game late in the 4th quarter. Then, with under a minute to go, when the Warriors were in transition, Steph Curry was taken out by LeBron james and lost the ball to the Cavs.
Here’s the play:
The NBA released a statement today acknowledging that the refs made the correct choice in not calling a foul on LeBron James on that play:
“James (CLE) cleanly strips the ball from Curry (GSW) before contact is made. The contact made after the strip is incidental to the players’ attempt to retrieve the ball,” the report states.
I have to say that this is quite shocking to hear from the NBA. In my opinion, it clearly seems as though LeBron just takes out the legs of Curry. While he might get some contact with his body onto the ball, it shouldn’t matter. You can’t just take out someone’s legs. If a player goes up for a lay-up and you get all ball, but you make contact with your body, the refs will call a foul. But according to them, this is not a foul!? I just don’t see how it isn’t. This is clearly excessive contact.
Nevertheless, it was another great game. Yes, it has been another poorly called 4th quarter, but it has still been a fantastic Finals thus far. Obviously, I understand how hard the job is from the refs, so I’m not going to act like I could make the right call in that scenario, but let’s hope we start to see less calls missed in this next game, regardless if this is labeled as a missed call or not.
Basketball Society 