Sunday marked a pair of firsts for Boston Celtics head coach Ime Udoka -- neither anything he'd be looking for entering Game 2 of the NBA Finals.
Udoka suffered the first NBA Finals loss of his head coaching career, 107-88 to the Golden State Warriors, and picked up his first technical foul as a head coach in the Finals.
It appears Udoka's T may have been by design, however.
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With Boston still clinging to life in the third quarter of Game 2, a period which wound up being its undoing, Udoka was called for a technical foul with 6:47 to go and the Celtics trailing, 67-56, after Udoka gave an earful to officials Zach Zarba and Tony Brothers following a call on Marcus Smart seconds earlier that resulted in a pair of free throws for Stephen Curry.
"I just let him know how I felt throughout the game, in a demonstrative way, on purpose, to get a technical," Udoka said, point blank, when asked about what happened on the call.
There were countless reasons the Celtics lost Game 2, and though the disparity in fouls called against each team was negligible -- 18 against Boston, 17 against Golden State, plus one tech against each team -- the flow of the game certainly differed from Game 1, when only 29 total fouls were whistled.
Draymond Green also received a technical foul for the Warriors in Game 2.
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Asked about Udoka's technical foul after the game, Celtics forward Al Horford said that he could see it coming a mile away.
"Just that whole first half, it was definitely different," Horford said in regards to the officiating. "We knew it was going to be different, but we kind of wanted to just stay the course. It is what it is. On to Game 3. I can't wait to get to the Garden. I know it's going to be rocking on Wednesday."