Paul George witnessed his Oklahoma City Thunder let go of the reins in a gripping loss to the LA Clippers last night - but he doesn't hold his teammates responsible for the final result. When asked to comment on OKC's demoralizing loss, PG redirected all the criticism towards the referees working the game. By the sound of it, this wasn't the first instance where refs duped the set, at least in George's mind. This is how he broke it down.
"It's just bad officiating," George told the press. "I'm sorry, just bad officiating. We don't get a fair whistle. We haven't gotten a fair whistle all year. ... Somebody's got to look into this. It's getting out of hand, where we somehow just walk teams to the line. And there's nobody that gets more contact. If I don't speak for myself, I speak for Russ. There's nobody that gets more contact than Russ going to the basket. And it's just crazy."
For the record, last night's loss to the Clippers' Win marked just 2nd time in the past 10 NBA seasons that a team had 3 of its starters ejected throughout the course of the game. In the case of the OKC Thunder, the starters subjected to the scrutiny just happened to be their 3 most important players: Russell Westbrook, Steven Adams, and Paul George himself, all getting the boot in the final 4 minutes of play.
Even OKC coach Billy Donovan seemed to agree with Paul's statement. "Our guys are playing hard and competing, but like there is no reason for Lou Williams to get to the free throw line 20 times," he commented while singling the opposition's most efficient scorer. The Thunder are still in a lofty position going forward as much as the loss stings in the interim. With the 118-110 result at home, the Clippers were able to maintain their one-point lead over the San Antonio Spurs for the 7th playoff spot in the Western Conference. OKC lives on to fight another day.
