DENVER (AP) — Timberwolves coach Chris Finch has yet to overcome the free throw deficit in the team’s series-opening loss to the Denver Nuggets.
“Maybe we should start losing as well,” Finch said before Monday night’s second game.
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More specifically, he was furious with Jamal Murray for shooting 16-for-16 from the line. Finch called Murray’s 16 free throws a “head-scratcher” in Saturday’s 116-105 loss to the Timberwolves, who shot 19 free throws.
Murray said after the game that he didn’t know what the fuss was about because he was repeatedly physically fouled by the Timberwolves.
“What do you want me to say? They weren’t all fouls. Some of them were fouls,” Finch said Monday. “The league is at a place right now where you draw contact and then you overflow and you get rewarded. Guys who try to make plays through contact, first-level contact, and keep drives and stuff like that, they tend to not get rewarded.”
Finch said his standouts Julius Randle and Anthony Edwards fall into that category.
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“Julius is not a loser. Ant is not a loser,” Finch said. “These are physical drivers. They play through the first line of contact a lot.”
When asked if players around the league were coached to glorify contact, Finch responded: “We don’t coach. Of course, the players know how to play the game. These guys are smart. They’re very talented, skilled guys with a ton of body control and ball skills, so they just play what the officials allow them to do.”
Finch added that he “sometimes doesn’t know how to answer our employees when they get frustrated. But we have to do better.”
The Nuggets’ David Adelman noted that some of Murray’s trips to the free throw line were due to flagrant and technical fouls on Minnesota’s first physical play.
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“This is the playoffs,” Adelman said. “Everyone will be involved in politics after the game.”
The second game had a different officiating staff.
“The cool thing about officiating in all sports is that every play is unique and you have to react to what six eyes are seeing,” Adelman said. “It changes every night.
“I do think sometimes when you watch film, you just say, ‘Yeah, that guy got fouled.’ “There are nights, trust me, we play…someone shoots a lot of free throws, and I don’t go back to the clip and say, ‘I can’t believe we got so many calls.’ I’m like, ‘Why are we fouling them so much?’ ‘”
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