Southeastern Conference Associate Commissioner Charles Bloom said the league did not plan to take any disciplinary action in regard to the Kentucky-Mississippi State game Tuesday night.
The Mississippi State fans, the referees and State Coach Rick Stansbury were all subject to speculation about possible reprimand or fine after Knetucky’s 81-75 overtime victory.
Of that speculation, Bloom said:
– The SEC would rely on Mississippi State’s internal investigation of fan behavior at the game.
Late in the game, plastic bottles came out of the stands and hit the floor. The SEC believed there were three bottles thrown, Bloom said.
– Referees Mike Stuart, Mike Kitts and Michael Stephens were the likely target of fan frustration. After State took a 67-60 lead with three minutes left, the referees called 10 fouls on Mississippi State and none on Kentucky.
Several calls were highly questionable, including a late whistle on a foul that sent John Wall to the foul line in overtime and a blocking call on State in which Patrick Patterson appeared to lower his shoulder and either charge or walk.
The SEC planned no disciplinary action against the referees, Bloom said.
– Stansbury used humor to say he disagreed with several calls. In response to a reporter’s question in the post-game news conference, he said his star big man Jarvis Varnado was the victim of more than one “nicky-pick” calls.
When a reporter prefaced a follow-up question by saying he didn’t want to belabor the point, Stansbury said, “Oh, belabor them (the referees). I know you want me to say something. Go ahead and belabor them.”
Then the State coach asked, “Are you going to pay my fine? Will you pay half of it? We’ll belabor the heck out of them.”
The SEC did not plan to fine or reprimand Stansbury, Bloom said.
2 comments ↓
As in most games there were questionable calls. But…..I disagree with J Tipton on the Wall foul. He delayed his shot and drew the foul as he has done many times this year. It was NOT a questionable call. On the Patterson, block/charge call, the ref had a lot of courage to call it against the home team. On the replay it looked like the defensive man was moving and thus the call was correct. The refs missed a goal tending call that went against Miss State, it was a very quick block but occurred after the ball had hit the backboard. Refs just missed it.
It seemed that Varnado was unable to handle the UK bigs and his fouls were not ticky tack. He often was just late on his defense and slapped at the ball hitting the offensive player’s arm. He seemed frustrated with his lack of “domination” that he had experienced in the past against the Cats.
I’m surprised that a HL reporter would see it so differently. I’ve looked at the calls and think the refs got it right most of the time but missed some calls during the game that went both ways. Refs don’t win/lose games, players/coaches do.
The one thing that stood out was that State really had the game won with a 7 pt lead and less than e3 minutes to go. However, they, like many teams, they played “not to lose” and that usually means you lose. Sometimes Cal sits on the ball too early and it has almost cost us in several games. It’s hard to sit on a 5-7 pt lead in the 3 pt era and most teams should just play it out, especially if they have superior talent as UK has in most instances. State tried to sit on the lead and couldn’t close it out, simple as that. They played a great game considering the difference in talent. It just proves that 3 pt shooters can win games. It they had hit 13 threes instead of 10 we would probably lost the game.
Jerry Tipton is a bad person.
Leave a Comment