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April 18, 2016C-Cap Recap: Death From Above
April 18, 2016Throughout Sunday’s victory over the Pistons in Game 1 of the first round of the NBA playoffs, there were some questionable non-calls on the Cavaliers and fouls called against Detroit that Stan Van Gundy did not appreciate. In an interview with Lisa Salters following the first quarter, Detroit head coach Stan Van Gundy made it known he felt referees are biased toward Cavs star LeBron James.
Per ESPN’s Nick Friedell:
“A couple calls have upset our guys. They’ve got to understand, LeBron’s LeBron. They’re not going to call offensive fouls on him. He gets to do whatever he wants. They’ve got to understand that.”
Whether it was James posting up an opponent or being physical both offensively and defensively, No. 23 seemed to be in playoff mode, but Van Gundy and the Pistons indicated theyt felt he received superstar calls and non-calls.
While the head coach backtracked on his comments following the game, what’s said was said and he seems to think that the star is treated unlike many other players in the NBA, especially when James has the ball. He believes the refs kept their whistles silent on two offensive fouls from James.
“Look, I thought it evened out really well. But early on, I thought there were two pretty obvious offensive fouls down there on him. But it’s two calls in an entire game after that. Look, the refereeing had nothing to do with tonight. They did a good job. It went both ways. I thought they did a really good job. It was decided by the players on the floor, as it should be.”
I mean, let’s be honest here, coach: James overpowers most of his competition, so there might be a few non-calls over the course of the game, especially the players that regularly guard him. There are also non-calls when James drives to the hoop and bullies through reaching arms and hip-checks given out by his defenders. But, whether Van Gundy and the Pistons still believe the referees missed foul calls on No. 23 or not, they better adjust because they the point-forward will be going up against them for at least three more games this series. It will be interesting to see if the referees change how they call fouls on James the rest of the series following Van Gundy’s comments on Sunday, but it is doubtful the ploy will do much to change the tone of the series.
11 Comments
He’s the master of panic.
SVG is clever as ever in how he sends messages to people, but he’s correct that the officials missed a couple of offensive fouls that maybe should have been called against Lebron, although in the playoffs the bar is a bit higher in general for getting calls. (see: Lebron only shooting 4 FT’s yesterday) The reality, though, is that most of the calls that went against Detroit were off the ball and/or of the holding variety. Other than Drummond, who Love stranded in a foreign land with unpainted floors, the Pistons were physically overmatched, and when that happens, you start getting called for grabbing arms and jerseys and stuff. The Cavs were also smarter about what kind of contact you can get away with, which comes with playoff experience. If the Pistons want to learn about non-calls, they should watch the Cavs-Celtics series from last year. Yesterday’s game was fairly tame in terms of what kind of contact was allowed, and I thought it went pretty evenly between the two teams overall.
Welcome back to the playoffs Stan Van Whiny!
agree with this. Stan skillfully sent contradictory messages to the league for fairness and to his young team for toughness. He’s good at this, and just watch: LeBron will be called for an offensive foul early on Wednesday, and Reggie Jackson will redirect his yapping from refs to the Cavs players.
Stars get calls in the NBA.
I’m stunned. Flabbergasted. Mouth agape.
I looked this book up in the library. I found under the author: Grapes, Sour.
Yeah, well, that just, like, your opinion, man…
In all seriousness, i didn’t see anything noteworthy or obvious on Lebron (at least on the ball). Lots of grabbing and clutching in the scrums, but seemed the physicality went both ways.
He’s probably still complaining about not getting the push-off foul called (:42).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fD1MNjkPFs
Just wondering Stan, does having a whole team on HGH fall under the umbrella of “doing whatever” to gain a competitive advantage? Because i cannot imagine, with so many players having since tested positive, that you were unaware of the activities of your 2009 Magic squad
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