Tensions bubbled to the surface in a pair of NBA games Tuesday night and resulted in scuffles — one in which officials dished out five technical fouls and another which saw Jeremiah Fears and Lu Dort go at each other.
Benches cleared at the end of the Oklahoma City Thunder’s 104-95 win over the New Orleans Pelicans when Dort shoved Fears and sparked an altercation. While the result of the game was obviously no longer in question, Fears approached the basket for a layup at the buzzer when Dort made contact with him for what arguably should have been called a foul. A kerfuffle between the two ensued, and players and coaches from both sides joined the mayhem to attempt to separate them.
After the game, Fears called Dort “soft” in a comment on an Instagram post.
Thunder coach Mark Daigneault put the onus on the officiating crew for allowing the situation to get out of hand.
“Good guys, good crew, but I thought they lost control of the game in the final minutes,” Daigneault said in his postgame media availability. “I thought that altercation at the end started well before that with the [Saddiq Bey and Jaylin Williams] situation. I thought they could have managed that cleaner.
“The second thing is, I think that’s a foul on Dort. And if it was, they should put a whistle on that play regardless of the score and the time, because if they do that, everybody stops playing and you can legislate the situation as you normally would. But because they didn’t put a whistle on it, it’s the end of the game, they can do nothing about it, and you end up with that situation.”
About an hour later, chaos broke out in the Phoenix Suns’ 106-102 win over the Brooklyn Nets.
During a scramble for a loose ball with under two minutes remaining in a two-point game, Nets guard Egor Dëmin shoved Suns forward Dillon Brooks to the floor, sparking a fracas between five players and leading numerous assistant coaches to rush from the benches and into the mix.
Dëmin’s escalation may have been in response to an incident earlier in the game when Brooks shoved him and received a technical foul.
Officials assessed technicals to Dëmin, Terance Mann and Michael Porter Jr. on the Nets’ side of the brouhaha and to Grayson Allen and Royce O’Neal on the Suns’ side.
“Those are just guys protecting each other and fighting for each other,” Nets coach Jordi Fernández said after the game. “I think they did a great job. You’re never going to let any of your teammates get hit or pushed or anything. Obviously there’s boundaries and we don’t want anybody to get hurt here, but you’ve seen a few dirty plays, and they didn’t call it. I think it got out of hand because of that. I like my guys sticking up for each other.”
Brooks’ technical foul for the earlier incident was his 15th of the season. He is one away from triggering an automatic one-game suspension.
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