The Minnesota Timberwolves lost to the Dallas Mavericks on Monday night in controversial fashion. With the T-Wolves trailing by two and three seconds remaining, Kevin Love received the inbound pass and tried to get a shot off. It appeared that he was fouled by Shawn Marion, but the officials chose to let the play go and time expired.
It was hard to tell if Love’s foot was on the line, but he should have been given a chance to tie the game with two free throws at the very least. Timberwolves radio play-by-play announcer Alan Horton was outraged.
Horton seemed most angry with referee Ed Malloy. After the game, Horton took to Twitter to remind fans of a game between the Timberwolves and Miami Heat last season — one that Malloy worked — where several controversial calls were met with a chorus of boos at the Target Center.
Love and Minnesota head coach Rick Adelman both ripped the officials when speaking to reporters after the game.
“He got fouled,” Adelman said. “I wonder what that would have been if (Dirk) Nowitzki, LeBron James, all the top players in the league — a guy reaches on a last-second shot like that, instead of challenging it. Maybe they don’t understand that Kevin is one of the top five players in this league. You make that call. But they didn’t.”
“I’m the type of person that if you see a foul, an obvious foul, you call it,” Love said. “And I thought that was pretty, pretty obvious. … You look at the replay and it was obvious he got arm.”
I agree. Officials would always rather let a questionable play go as time expires, but sometimes you have to call a foul. That should have been one of those instances, as Marion clearly whacked Love on the shoulder.
