Paul Pierce tried to end the season for Boston tonight. Lucky for him, he failed. The Indiana Pacers were handed a golden opportunity to clinch the series after second year player Kendrick Persons missed two free throws. They failed. The game went into overtime and the Celtics pulled out the victory without Pierce and LaFrentz (aka “The Jayhawk Job Squad”). The series now goes back to Boston for game 7.
The way the Pierce situation almost unfolded would have been another suspicious move by NBA officials. Here is an ESPN recap:
Boston led 84-83 at the time, and Pierce had just been intentionally fouled by Tinsley as the Pacers tried to stop the clock. Tinsley hit Pierce in the neck while fouling him, and Pierce appeared to swing his elbow in anger.
Referee Steve Javie did not immediately make a call. But after huddling with the other two officials, Pierce was assessed his second technical foul of the game — an automatic ejection. Reggie Miller hit the technical foul shot to tie the game,
Just the fact that the call was delayed for so long makes it look questionable. Some may argue that the refs wanted to make sure they got it right, but come on, you don’t get an easier technical than that. Did they have to push their David Stern waist band emergency button to get permission to make the call?
Anyways, it ended up being the correct call so you have to give the refs credit… I guess. However, if that was Ron Artest who threw that elbow do you think he would be playing in Game 7? You better believe Paul Pierce will be.
In semi-unrelated news, here is a nice piece on Game 5 from MSN/Fox Sports’ “Dime Magazine”. Apparently the reporter forgot to watch the game:
Boston was up by 15 points with about four minutes left in the third quarter, but the Pacers came storming back thanks to Mel-Mel The Abuser, playing for the first time in about ten weeks.
Actually, Indiana, not Boston, was up 15 and tried to blow it. And it wasn’t just a swap of names because there was certainly not a “storming back” of any kind as Boston slowly chipped away at the lead throughout the fourth quarter. But with that actual storyline you couldn’t get a “Mel-Mel The Abuser” reference in, so we’ll let it slide.
Eric Anderson at 8:28 pm
