38 free throws for Boston, 10 for the Lakers. Result? 17 point differential in free throws made. There is home court officiating, and then? Then? Then there is downright travesties.
I've watched the NBA for 24 years. Through every NBA conspiracy I've held on to a belief that the game is not rigged. My faith in this is not shaken. Do I think we will see such a favoritism in L.a? Not at all. At the very most, I expect maybe a 10 point free throw surplus in favor of the Lakers. That would be normal home cookin' as they say. But tonite was an embarrassment for the officiating crew.
One of my boys who is also a Lakers fan said that (before our comeback in the fourth) our defense was porous. In fact, he believed our the foul calls were a result of our poor play. I disagree.
Poor play? The Lakers had 18 points off turnovers, the Celts had 19. The Celts had 14 points on the fastbreak while the Lakers managed 10. Points in the paint saw the Lakers with a 31 to 30 advantage. So far the only overwhelming stat in favor of the Celts is field goal percentage , 53% to 49%. And that's not really overwhelming. Rebounding? The Celts had a plus one advantage.
So where was this game determined. With 83 shots and just shooting a shade under 50%, the only logical guess is the free throw line. Am I arguing that the Lakers didn't commit their share of fouls? Nope. I'm saying that the difference lies in referees perception of what teams are known for.
Since there are no regular readers of this blog, I'll openly admit that I have brought this point up in previous posts, most notably in the Pistons/Lakers Finals a few years back. My theory is this: when a team is known to be a "physical" team, they are allowed to reach and grab much more freely than a team not known for a physical style of play. This is ridiculously unfair. Even more unfair to the team abiding by the spirit of Naismith basketball (you know the one, basketball is a non-contact sport officially speaking), is that if the non-physical team attempts to become more physical, they get the whistle blown. Effectively, you're telling one team it is completely fine to push, grab, and reach while telling the other team it's a foul.
At this point, given our fourth quarter effort, I am only slightly discouraged. I would have loved to see us take one of these games in Boston as I love winning a series on your home floor if the opportunity is there. Now, assuming three wins in L.A., we have to win what would be an enormously intense game on the Celts floor. The disadvantage in that is the physicality allowed in a game six or seven will be increased. If the refs continue to allow one team to be physical while blowing the whistle on another team . .. . you get my point so I won't be a dead horse.
Sadly, right now I'm not even sure I want to watch a game with my boy which is a sad state of affairs. The way the conversation went, I was made to feel like my opinion didn't count, almost as if he knows more of basketball than I do.
In any case, Kobe, Lamar, Pau, Derek, Vladimir, Sasha, Jordan, Luke, Trevor, DJ, and the rest of the crew have some work to do. As a bleeder of Purple and Gold, I know it can be done.
Go Lakers!!!!!!!!
Update: To further enhance my point, here's what foxsports.com analyst Charley Rosen had to say:
Within the first couple of minutes, Perkins and then Garnett were tooted for committing moving screens. Both of these calls were highly questionable, and even though they favored the Lakers, they certainly boded ill for the visitors. When the visitors get the benefit of blatantly bogus fouls early in a game, the standard operating procedure tends to be that the refs will shaft them from then on. And that's exactly what happened.
A pair of phantom fouls on Kobe ruined the Lakers' first-half rotation, and at the intermission Boston had attempted 19 free throws to L.A.'s two (one of these being a technical foul on KG). After three quarters the margin was 26-to-4, and the final total was 38-to-10.
This disparity was even more puzzling since the Lakers' game-plan called for them to constantly drive the ball to the hole. And several replays showed exactly how biased and inconsistent the refs' decisions truly were.
No surprise, then, that the Lakers were distracted, annoyed and even outraged all game long. And rightly so.
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