“Fine Kemba Walker for flopping’: Jeff van Gundy furious with ‘hostile act’ review in Celtics vs Heat Game 5

Jeff van Gundy is among those people who always call a spade a spade. The referees’ decision to review an offensive foul by Dragic on Walker was met with some amazement by him.

The Miami Heat had the Boston Celtics in fits during the first half. Their defense stifled the Celtics initially, allowing just one made field goal off their first 12 attempts. They kept the Celtics at bay all through the first half and even got Kemba Walker and Jayson Tatum into foul trouble with 3 fouls apiece before the end of the 2nd quarter.

Also Read: ‘Jamal Murray hasn’t earned foul call vs LeBron James’: Draymond Green’s ‘superstar’ take on Lakers favored by refs

Jeff van Gundy calls out Kemba Walker for flopping

Goran Dragic picked up an offensive foul for hooking Kemba Walker’s arm with his own in the 2nd quarter. This was on the back of some aggressive defense being played by Kemba despite him being on 3 fouls at the time.

At the end of the play, Dragic’s elbow seemed to glance off Kemba’s face, who embellished that contact for all he was worth. This prompted the referees to go and take a look at the replays. But on live TV, it was glaringly obvious what Kemba had done.

van Gundy instantly launched into a tirade for the referees reviewing calls needlessly and stemming the flow of the game:

“What is this hostile act? There’s nothing going on there.” Van Gundy said in his tirade

“If anything that should be a $5000 fine on both Kemba and Dragic for flopping. These guys these days are just embellishing contact whatever chance they get.” he added.

ESPN’s Jeff Van Gundy: “I would rather them miss a ‘hostile act’ and us have flow to the game then them to be the hostile police…Do we not in the league want any flow to the game? Is this what we want in a Conference Finals game?”

— John Ourand (@Ourand_SBJ) September 26, 2020

Is Jeff Van Gundy right in his criticism?

Jeff van Gundy has always been a man of the people when it comes to criticizing the league for what he deems to be bad practices. Never does he shy away or mince words from speaking his mind on what he thinks the NBA should do.

On more than one occasion during these bubble games, van Gundy has been critical of the referees for the way they review plays for ‘hostile acts’. He picked up on it when Giannis was afforded a lifeline despite seemingly committing one on Daniel Theis in the two teams’ first seeding game.