Celtics cry foul as Giannis and Bucks bounce back
It’s a shot. He’s curling into his shot. He’s getting fouled on the way up. Bad missed call.
Celtics coach Ime Udoka
Giannis Antetokounmpo found a way to get better shots and recapture his peak form just in time to help the defending champion Milwaukee Bucks regain the lead in the Eastern Conference semifinals.
But it was the Boston Celtics’ bad timing that made the difference in the end.
Antetokounmpo bounced back from a rare subpar performance by compiling 42 points, 12 rebounds and eight assists, and making the goahead basket with 44.3 seconds left in a 103-101 victory yesterday. The Bucks lead the best-of-seven series 2-1, with Game 4 tomorrow in Milwaukee.
The victory wasn’t secure until replays confirmed that Al Horford’s potential tying putback — capping a wild sequence after Marcus Smart intentionally missed a free throw — came just after the buzzer.
“I saw Al tip it, and I saw the red outline go off on the backboard,” Bucks center Brook Lopez said. “It was very close.”
Boston trailed 103-100 when officials determined Smart was fouled by Jrue Holiday just before attempting a potential tying threepointer with 4.6 seconds remaining. Because it was a non-shooting foul, Smart got just two free-throw attempts. Smart made the first, then missed the second intentionally — flinging a shot that went hard off the backboard before hitting the rim. That’s when things got wild.
Smart got the rebound, but missed his putback attempt. Boston’s Robert Williams charged toward the basket and sent the ball up and off the glass. Horford was waiting on the right side with a putback attempt that also went off the glass. Horford then got his own rebound and banked it in, but his final shot came just after the buzzer sounded.
“Missed it perfectly,” Smart said. “Nobody was ready [but] our guys. Got it up on the rim. We had a few chances at it. Just didn’t work out for us.”
The Celtics believed Smart should have had an opportunity to tie the game at the line. Celtics coach Ime Udoka and Smart said it should have been a shooting foul on Holiday.
“You can clearly see it,” Udoka said. “I saw it in person, but also on the film. I just went and looked at it. It’s a shot. He’s curling into his shot. He’s getting fouled on the way up. Bad missed call.”
Holiday disagreed. “It looked like he was still facing the sideline,” said Holiday, who scored 25 points. “That’s not a shooting motion. He wasn’t facing the rim.”
Jaylen Brown led the Celtics with 27 points and 12 rebounds. Horford had 22 points, 15 rebounds and five assists. Boston trailed by 14 late in the third quarter and were facing a 13-point deficit with less than 10 minutes left before storming back but Antetokounmpo’s winning plays in the final minute highlighted his bounce-back performance.
In yesterday’s other game, Stephen Curry scored 30 points, Klay Thompson had 21 and nine rebounds and the Golden State Warriors shut down Ja Morant’s supporting cast to embarrass the Memphis Grizzlies 142-112 for a 2-1 lead in the Western Conference semifinals.
Morant’s three just before the halftime buzzer got the Grizzlies to within seven at the break and gave him 17 of his 34 points after a 47-point performance in Game 2. But Morant couldn’t do it alone for Memphis, and he was done after rubbing his tender right knee and limping off with 6:19 to play.
Jordan Poole scored 27 points off the bench and Andrew Wiggins added 17 points for Golden State, who used a 10-0 run out of halftime to take command for good.
Thompson shot eight for 13 with four three-pointers in a solid shooting night. He had been 11 for 38 from the floor, including five of 22 on threepointers, in the series before Game 3.
The Grizzlies’ Kiwi centre Steven Adams was available to play for the first time this series after coming out of the league’s Covid-19 health and safety protocols, but the big man didn’t play until the game was out of hand.