LOS ANGELES — Another night, another strong effort against a quality opponent and another loss. It’s been a frustrating season and a frustrating 1-3 road trip for the Toronto Raptors and safe to say, emotions are running high.
On Wednesday night Fred VanVleet wanted the world to know he’d had enough — with the way he thinks the Raptors have been officiated at least.
After Toronto’s 108-100 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers, the Raptors point guard paused for moment, and said “I don’t mind, I’ll take a fine, I don’t really care.”
The fine will be substantial as the calm, measured and forthright veteran proceeded to eviscerate referee Ben Taylor in particular and the state of NBA officiating in general in a manner unlike you’ll ever hear again.
“I thought Ben Taylor was f—–g terrible tonight,” he began. “I think that most nights, you know out of the three [referees] there’s one or two that just f–k the game up. It’s been like that a couple of games in a row. Denver was tough, obviously.”
Raptors’ VanVleet goes off on way Clippers game was officiated and reffing this season
The context matters. Toronto is two nights removed from a last-minute loss to the Denver Nuggets that was decided by a number of coin-flip type calls that went against the Raptors and culminated with a sudden ejection of Scottie Barnes by crew chief Scott Foster after the veteran official claimed that the second-year forward questioned the crew’s integrity, though Barnes is adamant he was speaking to himself.
The frustration with Barnes’ ejection reverberated around the Raptors organization. The pump was primed. The loss to the Clippers tipped things over.
Against the Clippers the Raptors had more field goal attempts (96-71), more offensive rebounds (15-9), fewer turnovers (17-12) and made more threes (13-6) but lost in part because Los Angeles got to the free throw line 31 times to 14 for Toronto.
And for Toronto, every game matters. The loss dropped the ninth-place Raptors a game-and-a-half behind Atlanta for eighth place and leaves them just a half-game up on Washington for 10th.
Why the Clippers had the edge in free throws could be for a number of reasons. The actual discrepancy in fouls called wasn’t all that significant: 23 for Toronto to 18 for Los Angeles. But the Raptors put the Clippers into the bonus with four minutes to go in the second quarter, and again with 5:51 left in the game. As well former Raptor Kawhi Leonard — playing some of the best basketball of his career after recovering from missing all of last season with a knee injury — was his aggressive best and got to the line nine times.
And as Chris Boucher pointed out, a lot of fouls often come as a result of being a hair late defensively.
“Sometimes it’s just a tick-tack foul [and] we could be in better position. At the end of the day, it starts costing us a lot when they’re at the free throw line,” Boucher said.
The Clippers shot 54.9 per cent from the floor.
So there are plausible explanations for the discrepancy, but that’s not where the Raptors — and VanVleet — wanted to go after the game. He was especially vexed by a technical foul Taylor called on him at the 7:02 mark of the third quarter after Barnes was called for a foul on Ivica Zubac.
“You come out tonight, competing pretty hard and I get a bulls–t tech that changes the whole dynamic of the game, changed the whole flow of the game,” said VanVleet.
The Raptors (32-35) started the game well and led 25-17 after the first quarter and were tied 49-49 at half with the Clippers (35-33) who are in as tough a fight for the playoffs as the Raptors find themselves. Toronto was trailing by seven when VanVleet picked up his technical foul which he says was because he said to his teammates: “‘come on, guys, let’s keep playing through the bulls–t.”
Did the game turn at that moment? Toronto actually went on an 8-2 run and cut the Clippers’ lead to two immediately after the call, but the Clippers responded with a 13-2 run over the next three minutes — a stretch in which only the Raptors got to the line, ironically — as Los Angeles took an 83-74 lead into the fourth quarter.
That’s when the free-throw disparity became more pronounced as the Clippers shot 13 freebies to four for Toronto.
Tim Micallef stands by VanVleet’s post game rant | Tim and Friends
But it was also during the fourth that Leonard — who came into the game averaging 28.4 points, 6.4 rebounds, 4.0 assists and 1.8 steals while shooting 52.6 per cent from the floor, 49.6 per cent from three (on more than five attempts per game) and 91.5 per cent from the line of his last 22 starts — showed he can lift teams over the finish line as the Clippers have been waiting for him to do since he signed with them in the summer of 2019.
“The only probably complaint I had late [about the Raptors defence] is Kawhi got straight on a line downhill a little bit on us late,” said Raptors head coach Nick Nurse. “Take those four or five straight line drives out of there, and then I think it looks really good.”
Leonard’s knack for making game-determining plays almost at will remains intact.
As examples: midway through the fourth quarter the Raptors were hopeful of making a run and they had their starters back in, down 10. But after a missed VanVleet three Leonard was able to snatch an offensive rebound from the grip of Jakob Poeltl and fire it up the floor to Paul George (23 points, four assists), who lobbed a perfect alley-oop to Terance Mann (14 points, four assists off the bench) for an eventual three-point play.
Next possession Leonard blew past O.G. Anunoby, rose up and smashed a dunk over Poeltl, proof that all-NBA calibre defence and quality rim protection are no match for him. On the Clippers’ next possession, Leonard won a race to a loose ball with VanVleet, batted it to Mann before falling into the front row of seats and went to the line again. The mini-surge put the Clippers up by 14 and the game was mostly in their control.
Kawhi Leonard puts Raptors’ Poeltl on a poster with powerful slam
And VanVleet acknowledged that for all his frustration, the officials didn’t decide the game.
“That’s not why we lost tonight, we got outplayed, but it definitely makes it tougher to overcome,” he said.
Toronto got 13 points and nine assists from VanVleet; 20 points, five rebounds and four assists from Barnes (although he was 6-of-21 from the floor); and 20 points and five assists from Pascal Siakam, but it wasn’t enough to overcome Leonard, the Clippers, or the referees, to hear VanVleet tell it.
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But his comments were compelling not only because it was him making them — speaking in anger or without weighing his words is simply not his habit — but because he touched on a broader context than being on the wrong end of a bad call.
He spoke about the nature of the role officials play in the game itself and their relationship with players — or at least with him. He cast his net widely.
“Most of the refs are trying hard, I like a lot of the refs, they’re trying hard, they’re pretty fair, and communicate well,” he said. “And then you got the other ones who just want to be d–s and just kind of f–k up the game. And no one’s coming to see that s–t. They come to see the players. And I think we’re losing a little bit of the fabric of what the NBA is and was and it’s been disappointing this season. You can look it up: Most of my techs this year have been with Ben Taylor officiating. So at a certain point as a player you feel it’s personal and it’s never a good place to be.”
VanVleet’s technical against the Clippers was his eighth of the season — his previous career-high was five in 2020-21. For what it’s worth Taylor was refereeing the Raptors’ Nov. 30 loss to the New Orleans Pelicans, the only time VanVleet has ever been ejected. Taylor — a 10-year veteran — gave him his first tech that night, but not his second.
“There’s been certain times this year where I feel our team is getting consumed with the way the whistle is going, especially after the night we just had in Denver the way that finished so there was a couple calls earlier that we all disagreed with,” said VanVleet.
“And if I say to my team, ‘come on, guys, let’s keep playing through the bulls–t’ and that warrants a tech I think that’s a little bit crazy. Like what are we doing, know what I mean? And there’s a fine line obviously, I understand that. But I think the jurisdiction and the power trip that we’ve been on this year with some of our officials in this league is getting out of hand and I’ll take my fine for speaking on it but it’s just this is f–king ridiculous.”
VanVleet said his piece, and he’ll pay for it by way of a fine. It will be interesting how it affects the way he and the Raptors are officiated the rest of this season and beyond.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – Canada’s Gabriela Dabrowski and New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe remain undefeated in women’s doubles at the WTA Finals.
The 2023 U.S. Open champions, seeded second at the event, secured a 1-6, 7-6 (1), (11-9) super-tiebreak win over fourth-seeded Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini in round-robin play on Tuesday.
The season-ending tournament features the WTA Tour’s top eight women’s doubles teams.
Dabrowski and Routliffe lost the first set in 22 minutes but levelled the match by breaking Errani’s serve three times in the second, including at 6-5. They clinched victory with Routliffe saving a match point on her serve and Dabrowski ending Errani’s final serve-and-volley attempt.
Dabrowski and Routliffe will next face fifth-seeded Americans Caroline Dolehide and Desirae Krawczyk on Thursday, where a win would secure a spot in the semifinals.
The final is scheduled for Saturday.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published on Nov. 5, 2024.
EDMONTON – Jake Allen made 31 saves for his second shutout of the season and 26th of his career as the New Jersey Devils closed out their Western Canadian road trip with a 3-0 victory over the Edmonton Oilers on Monday.
Jesper Bratt had a goal and an assist and Stefan Noesen and Timo Meier also scored for the Devils (8-5-2) who have won three of their last four on the heels on a four-game losing skid.
The Oilers (6-6-1) had their modest two-game winning streak snapped.
Calvin Pickard made 13 stops between the pipes for Edmonton.
TAKEAWAYS
Devils: In addition to his goal, Bratt picked up his 12th assist of the young season to give him nine points in his last eight games and now 15 points overall. Nico Hischier remains in the team lead, picking up an assist of his own to give him 16 points for the campaign. He has a point in all but four games this season.
Oilers: Forward Leon Draisaitl was held pointless after recording six points in his previous two games and nine points in his previous four. Draisaitl usually has strong showings against the Devils, coming into the contest with an eight-game point streak against New Jersey and 11 goals in 17 games.
KEY MOMENT
New Jersey took a 2-0 lead on the power play with 3:26 remaining in the second period as Hischier made a nice feed into the slot to Bratt, who wired his third of the season past Pickard.
KEY RETURN?
Oilers star forward and captain Connor McDavid took part in the optional morning skate for the Oilers, leading to hopes that he may be back sooner rather than later. McDavid has been expected to be out for two to three weeks with an ankle injury suffered during the first shift of last Monday’s loss in Columbus.
OILERS DEAL FOR D-MAN
The Oilers have acquired defenceman Ronnie Attard from the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for defenceman Ben Gleason.
The 6-foot-3 Attard has spent the past three season in the Flyers organization seeing action in 29 career games. The 25-year-old right-shot defender and Western Michigan University grad was originally selected by Philadelphia in the third round of the 2019 NHL Entry Draft. Attard will report to the Oilers’ AHL affiliate in Bakersfield.
UP NEXT
Devils: Host the Montreal Canadiens on Thursday.
Oilers: Host the Vegas Golden Knights on Wednesday.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 4, 2024.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Patrick Mahomes threw for 291 yards and three touchdowns, and Kareem Hunt pounded into the end zone from two yards out in overtime to give the unbeaten Kansas City Chiefs a 30-24 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Monday night.
DeAndre Hopkins had two touchdown receptions for the Chiefs (8-0), who drove through the rain for two fourth-quarter scores to take a 24-17 lead with 4:17 left. But then Kansas City watched as Baker Mayfield led the Bucs the other way in the final minute, hitting Ryan Miller in the end zone with 27 seconds to go in regulation time.
Tampa Bay (4-5) elected to kick the extra point and force overtime, rather than go for a two-point conversion and the win. And it cost the Buccaneers when Mayfield called tails and the coin flip was heads. Mahomes and the Chiefs took the ball, he was 5-for-5 passing on their drive in overtime, and Hunt finished his 106-yard rushing day with the deciding TD plunge.
Travis Kelce had 14 catches for 100 yards with girlfriend Taylor Swift watching from a suite, and Hopkins finished with eight catches for 86 yards as the Chiefs ran their winning streak to 14 dating to last season. They became the sixth Super Bowl champion to start 8-0 the following season.
Mayfield finished with 200 yards and two TDs passing for the Bucs, who have lost four of their last five.
It was a memorable first half for two players who had been waiting to play in Arrowhead Stadium.
The Bucs’ Rachaad White grew up about 10 minutes away in a tough part of Kansas City, but his family could never afford a ticket for him to see a game. He wound up on a circuitous path through Division II Nebraska-Kearney and a California junior college to Arizona State, where he eventually became of a third-round pick of Tampa Bay in the 2022 draft.
Two year later, White finally got into Arrowhead — and the end zone. He punctuated his seven-yard scoring run in the second quarter, which gave the Bucs a 7-3 lead, by nearly tossing the football into the second deck.
Then it was Hopkins’ turn in his first home game since arriving in Kansas City from a trade with the Titans.
The three-time All-Pro, who already had caught four passes, reeled in a third-down heave from Mahomes amid triple coverage for a 35-yard gain inside the Tampa Bay five-yard line. Three plays later, Mahomes found him in the back of the end zone, and Hopkins celebrated his first TD with the Chiefs with a dance from “Remember the Titans.”
Tampa Bay tried to seize control with consecutive scoring drives to start the second half. The first ended with a TD pass to Cade Otton, the latest tight end to shred the Chiefs, and Chase McLaughlin’s 47-yard field goal gave the Bucs a 17-10 lead.
The Chiefs answered in the fourth quarter. Mahomes marched them through the rain 70 yards for a tying touchdown pass, which he delivered to Samaje Perine while landing awkwardly and tweaking his left ankle, and then threw a laser to Hopkins on third-and-goal from the Buccaneers’ five-yard line to give Kansas City the lead.
Tampa Bay promptly went three-and-out, but its defence got the ball right back, and this time Mayfield calmly led his team down field. His capped the drive with a touchdown throw to Miller — his first career TD catch — with 27 seconds to go, and Tampa Bay elected to play for overtime.
UP NEXT
Buccaneers: Host the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday.
