Indiana Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle could be in hot water for his comments following the Pacers Game 2 loss to the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden.
Carlisle was ejected towards the end of the game and has not been pleased with the officiating thus far in the series.
Carlisle went as far to imply that the NBA has an agenda against smaller market teams such as the Indiana Pacers during his post-game press conference.
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Rick Carlisle on the overturned double-dribble call toward the end of Q4 tonight: “That’s small beans compared to everything else. Small market teams deserve an equal shot. They deserve a fair shot no matter where they’re playing”
The NBA is certainly not going to be happy with this allegation and Carlisle may be hearing from the league office.
Game 1 which was also won by the Knicks was controversial as well as fans stormed social media alleging the game was rigged in favor of the Knicks.
Even NBA superstar Joel Embiid, whose Philadelphia 76ers were eliminated by the Knicks in the first round, seemed to imply that the officiating definitely favored the Knicks.
Notably, Indiana Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton did not blame the officiating for losing the first two games of the series.
Tyrese Haliburton: “They outplayed us. Let’s not pretend like the refs are the reason we lost. We just got to be better”
The Pacers are now in a 2-0 hole as the series heads to Indianapolis for Games 3 and 4.
Both will of course be pivotal for the Pacers to win as no team in NBA history has ever come back down 3-0 in a playoff series and teams that go down 3-1 in a series have only won the series 13 times out of 271 chances.
