The Dallas Mavericks lost to the Atlanta Hawks on Saturday night and following the game, Mark Cuban lost his mind on the officials.
With 8.4 seconds to play in the game and Atlanta leading by two-points, Dorian Finney-Smith blocked Trae Young’s attempted shot. Officials blew the whistle and called the block a goaltend. As this happened, John Collins grabbed the ball and scored. Following review, it was determined that the block was clean and not a goaltend, but that Collins was in his shooting motion as the whistle blew. The officials waived off the goaltending call, but counted Collins’ basket. This gave the Hawks a four-point lead and effectively ended the game.
Following the game, Crew Chief Rodney Mott spoke with a pool reporter and said:
Dallas coach Rick Carlisle expressed confusion over the call after the game. Carlisle said counting Collins’ basket was “hard to fathom”.
It didn’t stop there, as noted referee critic Cuban unleashed a series of tweets blasting the sequence:
Cuban is no stranger to run-ins with the NBA over officiating. In 2002, after saying the NBA’s head of officiating Ed T. Rush “wouldn’t be able to manage a Dairy Queen”, Cuban was fined by the NBA. He then famously accepted Dairy Queen’s invitation to work for a day at one of their Texas locations.
Overall, Cuban has been fined over $1.6 million for various infractions during his tenure as owner of the Mavericks. He had notably softened his public criticism of referees in recent years, before his outburst on Saturday night. Cuban’s most recent fine was for $600,000 in 2018 for publicly saying that Dallas should “tank for the rest of the season” when the Mavericks were struggling.
This series of tweets, as well as comments made directly to the media, are bound to add to the money Cuban has donated to NBA-supported charities over the years.
