Dennis Schroder feels like the referees blew it at the end of Game 3 on Thursday.
Schroder’s Detroit Pistons narrowly lost to the New York Knicks by the final of 118-116, thus falling behind 2-1 in their first-round playoff series. The tight battle was marked by a controversial no-call with 5.8 seconds left.
Leading 116-113 at the time, the Knicks inbounded the ball to star guard Jalen Brunson, who crossed from the frontcourt to the backcourt as he received the pass. Many believed that the play should have been called as a backcourt violation, which would have given the Pistons possession and a chance to tie the game.
Instead though, the play went uncalled. Brunson would eventually get fouled and go to the free throw line as the Knicks held on to win. You can view the sequence for yourself below.
In a post to his Instagram Story on Friday, Schroder called out the referees over the controversial play. With only an eyeballs emoji in his caption, Schroder posted three separate screenshots of Brunson taking the ball from the frontcourt to the backcourt.
In reality though, it was a correct no-call by the referees. As confirmed by the NBA’s last two-minute report for the game that was released on Friday, Brunson did not establish a “positive position” in the frontcourt because his momentum was carrying him into the backcourt when he received the pass. Thus, there was no over-and-back violation on the play.
Interestingly enough, the Pistons themselves benefited from a controversial clock malfunction just seconds later that gave them their chance to tie the game, which they squandered (video here). But that isn’t stopping Schroder from expressing some public displeasure about what he saw as a missed backcourt violation by Brunson prior to that.
