Pistons' Van Gundy furious with officials after loss to Blazers: 'We got screwed'
The Detroit Pistons are struggling to dig themselves out of a hole created by an abysmal 2-10 record since the All-Star break - a task made exponentially more difficult when the whistle isn't going in their favor.
That's how Stan Van Gundy viewed Saturday's matchup with the Portland Trail Blazers at the Moda Center, anyway. The outspoken Pistons head coach feared no repercussions from the NBA when he ripped into the officiating for what he felt was unfair treatment of his players.
"It's embarrassing. It's embarrassing for them and embarrassing for the league," Van Gundy said of the refs following his team's 100-87 loss, according to ESPN.
"I've been here for four years and (in the NBA for) many more years before that, and I've never come in after a game - never, never come in after a game - and talked like this. That was embarrassing. We got absolutely screwed tonight."
Van Gundy then went into specifics on what he saw on the hardwood that bothered him the most, bringing up instances where his players got hacked on drives to the basket that went unnoticed.
"They held and grabbed on every play and they got away with fouls all over the place. We got absolutely screwed all night," he added. "Luke Kennard makes a back cut to the basket on an out-of-bounds play, gets knocked down, they end up with two points on the other end. Blake Griffin has two straight drives in the fourth that he gets hammered on. He gets screwed twice."
Portland was actually whistled for one more foul (17) than Detroit (16) while taking two fewer free throws (16-of-18) than the opposition (15-of-20). Van Gundy did credit the Blazers' seventh-ranked defense for its performance, at least, while taking one more shot at refs.
"A big part of (the Blazers') defense - they play very hard, I don't mean to take anything away from them - but when you can get away with playing like that and get screwed that badly by the officials, your defense is going to be pretty good," Van Gundy said.
The Pistons are now 30-39 on the season and 6.5 games back of the Miami Heat for the eighth seed in the Eastern Conference.