HOUSTON – For the first 47 minutes and 57 seconds on Wednesday, the Warriors and Houston Rockets found themselves in a throwback mid-90s fight of a basketball game despite the bright-red Toyota Center floor being more eye-burning than futuristic.
Referees held onto their whistles. Any anger these former Western Conference rivals had could be taken care of themselves instead of the hall monitors trying to send someone to detention for hard contact. With the game on the line and only three seconds remaining as the Warriors led by one, crew chief Bill Kennedy decided to change course and take control in Golden State’s eventual 91-90 loss in the NBA Cup quarterfinals.
Steph Curry’s game-sealing 3-point attempt at the 11-second mark went wide-right. It then bounced off both Alperen Sengun and Fred VanVleet. Neither could hold on. But neither could Gary Payton II, who seemingly had control for a split second, before rolling it on the floor from the ground in an attempted pass to teammate Jonathan Kuminga. That’s when the real chaos ensued.
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Kuminga and Rockets guard Jalen Green both scrambled for the ball. Every Rocket was calling a timeout. What was assumed to either be a jump ball or timeout for the Rockets ended in the worst-case scenario for the Warriors.
HOUSTON HAS THE LEAD AFTER THIS WILD SEQUENCE 😱 pic.twitter.com/vg6xPLZUBx
— NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) December 12, 2024
Kennedy called a foul on Kuminga, giving Green, shooting 87.2 percent from the free-throw line entering the night, two shots at the charity stripe. Both went in, and Brandin Podziemski’s 3-point shot on the other side was blocked. Game over.
Warriors coach Steve Kerr’s jaw dropped at the foul call. Buddy Hield covered his face. Nobody could believe what just happened.
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After the loss, an incensed and shaky Kerr let all his frustrations out in an epic tirade.
“I've never seen a loose-ball foul on a jump-ball situation 80 feet from the basket with the game on the line,” Kerr said. “I've never seen that. I think I saw it in college one time 30 years ago. Never seen it in the NBA. That is unconscionable. I don't even understand what just happened.
“Loose ball, diving on the floor, 80 feet from the basket and you're going to give a guy two free throws to decide the game when people are scrambling for the ball. Just give them a timeout. Give them a timeout and let the players decide the game. That's how you officiate, especially because the game was a complete wrestling match. They didn't call anything.
“Steph Curry got hit on the elbow, plain as day, on a jump shot. Just clubbed right on the arm – no call. You've established you're just not going to call anything throughout the game. It's a physical game. You’re going call a loose-ball foul on a jump-ball situation with guys diving on the floor with the game on the line. This is a billion-dollar industry. You’ve got people's jobs on the line. I am stunned. I'm stunned.
“I give the Rockets credit. They battled back, they played great defense all night. But I feel for our guys. Our guys battled back, played their asses off and deserved to win that game – or at least have a chance for one stop at the end to finish the game. And that was taken from us by a call that I don't think an elementary school referee would have made, because that guy would have had feel and said, ‘You know what, I'm not going to decide a game on a loose ball 80 feet from the basket.’ ”
Steve Kerr comments on the controversial call at the end of tonight's Warriors-Rockets NBA Cup game
— Warriors on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcswarriors.bsky.social) December 11, 2024 at 9:35 PM
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Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle served as the Pool Reporter, asking Kennedy why a loose-ball foul was called 80 feet from the basket.
Here’s Kennedy’s response and reasoning:
Here’s Bill Kennedy’s explanation of the loose ball foul from the Pool Report pic.twitter.com/ekUPkFW4mH
— Dalton Johnson (@DaltonJ_Johnson) December 12, 2024
The foul on Curry’s shot attempt that Kerr referenced happened when the Warriors led by six points, 78-72, with a little over eight minutes remaining in the game. Curry, with Aaron Holiday on his back, turns for a deep two-point shot 20 feet from the basket.
Yet it fell multiple feet short of the rim, an uncanny airball from the game’s greatest shooter. The reason, as seen on replay, is that Holiday’s right hand clearly hits Curry’s right wrist and hand area.
In return, Tari Eason hit a 3-pointer, a five-point swing that cut the Warriors’ lead to three points.
“We can talk about the refs all day; that’s not why we lost,” Curry said. “But there are swings in the game. Obviously the last two free throws, and then that play is a five-point swing where [referee Mousa Dagher] said the ball was already released and then he hit my hand or wrist.
“I’m like, ‘Well, if I shoot an 18-footer and I miss by six feet, then either you tell me he hit the ball or it’s a foul.’ I’ve never shot an 18-footer 12 feet. Then they go down and Eason hits a three in the corner. That’s a huge swing.
“We can’t let the refs take us out of it, which I don’t think we did, but those are clear plays that can dictate a very tough game, low-scoring game where you give a team an extra possession that they don’t deserve, which is why I was going crazy. I don’t yell at the refs like that. It was a clear foul.”
The refs are the obvious storyline after such a wild, hectic loss. But nobody placed more blame on themselves than Payton.
Always joyful, Payton was despondent at his locker. At the podium, he took full accountability.
“Unfortunate. Dumb play by me,” Payton said. “Unfortunate call leads to that. Just is what it is.”
“Hold the ball,” Payton added. “Jump ball. Two seconds, one second left – game over.”
The silver lining of the loss is the Warriors now get to come home, where they’ll take on Klay Thompson and the Dallas Mavericks at Chase Center on Sunday night. Instead of a grueling 11-day road trip where they would have traveled to Las Vegas to first play the Oklahoma City Thunder in the semifinals for a chance at the NBA Cup championship, and then head to Memphis and Minnesota, the Warriors will be back in the Bay where they’ll play one game in a week-long stretch.
Kerr’s mind was nowhere near Sunday. All he could think about were those final few seconds, that call by Kennedy and making sure he made his message loud and clear to the league.
“I’m not ready to answer that question,” he said. “I’m pissed off. I wanted to go to Las Vegas. We wanted to win this Cup. We aren’t going because of a loose-ball foul 80 feet from the basket with the game on the line. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life, and that was ridiculous.”