Kyrie Irving committed a crucial offensive foul in the 4th quarter in a nail-biter against the Cavs. The call was overturned later on.
Advertisement
For the first time, we saw the trio of Kyrie Irving, James Harden and Kevin Durant kit up together on the same team. James Harden has had two games where he didn’t disappoint.
The 2018 NBA MVP scored a historic 32-point triple-double in his Nets debut. The trio combined for a majestic 96 points, 22 assists and 29 rebounds last night, with Harden having yet another 21-points triple-double.
The late offensive foul on Kyrie Irving was overturned, sending Nets-Cavs to overtime.
🎥: @SportsCenter
pic.twitter.com/3OlMmlTG6E— USA TODAY NBA (@usatodaynba) January 21, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
22-year old Collin Sexton was the reason behind the disappointing start for the Nets’ big three’s debut. The young Cavaliers’ leader scored a season-high 42 points in the 38 minutes he played. 15 points of which were scored by him only in the second overtime (5 minutes).
Richard Jefferson defends Kyrie Irving until he sees the slow-motion replay
But a controversial call occurred in the 4th quarter of the match with 1.5 seconds remaining. The score was tied at 113-113. Kyrie Irving was dribbling the ball trying to get passed Collin Sexton, where Kyrie shoved Sexton with his elbow. An immediate foul was called on the former.
After the review of the foul, the call was overturned but resulted in a jump ball from the centre court. Only 1.5 seconds remained on the clock, thus leading the match into overtime without a shot even being attempted. As the foul call occurred, Richard Jefferson disagreed with the call, defending Kyrie Irving: “He (Sexton) lunged forward as Kyrie went by.”
After seeing the replay, Jefferson hilariously said “like I said before, Kyrie definitely elbows him in the face”, finally agreeing with the call.
The Cleveland Cavaliers have now a record of 7-7 and are on the 6th spot of the Eastern Conference. As for the Brooklyn Nets, they have a better record of 9-7, being 5th in the Eastern Conference.