With his Toronto Raptors trailing by 25 points late in the third quarter of Monday's Game 5 loss to the Boston Celtics, All-Star point guard Kyle Lowry was whistled for a technical foul for jawing at the officials.
A visibly frustrated Serge Ibaka then called on Lowry to settle down, yelling, "Come on man, we're losing," according to ESPN's Andrew Lopez.
After the game, Fred VanVleet downplayed the exchange between his veteran teammates, chalking it up as par for the course in a frustrating outing.
"Kyle had his moment with the refs and Serge had his moment with Kyle and we moved on, moved past it," VanVleet told reporters. "It happens. Brothers, you know? It's a lot at stake, it's a lot on the mind, and those type of things are going to happen.
"But it wasn't as bad as it looked, I can tell you that much. That's an everyday thing on our team - guys just being honest. And we have a lot of passionate guys, so it's just part of the process."
According to VanVleet, the exchange only came under scrutiny because of the stripped-down nature of game action within the NBA bubble.
"I think it's a little bit worse here; there's no fans, no crowd noise," he reasoned. "Those frustrations happen all the time. You guys don't see a lot of them, but that was one that was obviously visible and you probably could hear a little bit there if you were here in the arena."
