Durant apologizes: ‘I was being a jerk’

A day after accusing referee James Williams of targeting him, Warriors forward Kevin Durant apologized for “being a jerk.”

“I looked at a couple of techs, and the plays, and I was being an —hole last night,” Durant said after practice Wednesday. “I was being a jerk.”

At one point in the first half of Tuesday night’s 123-112 win over the Knicks, Durant crossed over his defender along the right wing and was called for carrying. Durant and Williams went back and forth about the call. Late in the third quarter, after getting called for a foul on a block attempt, Durant bounced the ball angrily and was immediately assessed a technical.

After the game, Durant said that Williams “went into halftime, probably with an attitude. So second half, his whole thing was he’s trying to get me. So, look at my first tech. I got the rebound, dribbled the ball hard and he tech’d me up. He was searching for me. He was looking to try to tech me up to get me back because he’s still in his feelings from the first half.”

With less than three minutes left in the game, Durant argued a no-call with Williams and was assessed his second technical, prompting his fourth ejection of the season. Earlier this season, Durant had three in an 18-game span, one more than he had in his previous 810 games.

“That one foul at the end wasn’t a foul,” said Durant, who reviewed the plays when he got home Tuesday. “I shouldn’t have slammed the ball down like I did. I can go back and say I was being a jerk last night, and I deserve whatever the league is going to throw at me. I wish I had handled that better, obviously, but it was kind of heat of the moment for me. I could be better. It was a great learning experience for me, though.”

Durant conceded that he was upset he got called for the carry on the crossover, one of his signature moves, and let his emotions spill over to the rest of the game.

“I felt like I made a good move, and he called a carry,” Durant said. “That’s one of those calls you don’t get all the time, and it irritated me, I guess. I wish I could apologize to James because that was definitely out of my character.”