Indiana coach Rick Carlisle said Wednesday that “small-market teams deserve an equal shot” during a complaint about the officiating in his team's loss to the
Carlisle was called for two technical fouls and ejected late as his Pacers fell 130-121, putting them in a 2-0 hole in the“I’m always talking to our guys about not making it about the officials and, but, we deserve a fair shot,” Carlisle said.“In the playoffs, when you submit things, the other team can see what you submit. And so, there were 29 plays in Game 1 that we thought were clearly called the wrong way.
He cited a play in the third quarter where he felt the Knicks' Josh Hart shoved All-Star point guard Tyrese Haliburton — who has been battling back spasms — in the back. “It’s all over Twitter right now because a few people have showed it to me and JB DeRosa is looking right at it,” Carlisle said. “You can see he has vision of the play and he shoves Tyrese into the corner and there is no whistle. Right in the back. That was shocking and there were many others. But I can promise you that we are going to submit these tonight. New York can get ready. They can see them, too."“At the end of the day we got outplayed.
But Carlisle, who felt Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau's yelling at the officials got a late double dribble violation against center Isaiah Hartenstein changed to an inadvertent whistle that allowed New York to keep the ball, wants things to change when the series moves to Indiana for Game 3 on Friday.