The NBA review of the final two minutes and overtime of the Hawks’ 114-112 victory over the Spurs Sunday night found two incorrect calls – a missed foul call against each team.
One of the missed foul calls came when the Spurs’ Manu Ginoboli got tangled with the Hawks’ Mike Muscala just before Tim Hardaway Jr. hit a game-tying 3-pointer with 3.3 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter that sent the game in overtime. The report ruled Ginoboli grabbed Muscala with 6.3 seconds left and should have been called for a personal foul.
Muscala set a screen on Ginoboli after getting the inbounds pass from Kyle Korver and passing to Dennis Schroder. Schroder passed to Hardaway to assist on the game-tying basket. According to the report, Ginobili “grabs and pulls Muscala after the screen and affects his freedom of movement.”
Muscala was concerned following the game whether he could have been called for a moving screen.
“I thought they were going to be switching,” Muscala told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Tim did a good job of separating from his man. That caused some confusion. It seemed like it possible could have been a moving screen but there is a lot of tangling going on.”
The report also found that Dwight Howard should have been called for a foul against LaMarcus Aldridge with 1:09 remaining in the fourth quarter. The Hawks trailed by three points, 98-95, at the time. After Tony Parker rebounded his own miss, Aldridge had the ball and stepped out of bounds for a turnover a second after the missed foul call.
The NBA issues its Last Two Minutes report as an assessment of officiated events that occurred in the last two minutes of games within five points at the two-minute mark (and during overtime, when applicable). The plays assessed include all calls (whistles) and notable non-calls.
