Young ejected during play-in loss, as frustration boils over

Atlanta's star guard Trae Young threw a hard pass and showed off a little fancy ball handling. Ordinarily, those are good things.

Doing it against referees is frowned upon, however — and the NBA said he was "making a mockery of the game".

Young's frustration with how the Hawks' play-in game at Orlando was going finally boiled over with 4:47 left Tuesday night, when he earned a pair of technical fouls — one for rifling a chest pass at referee James Williams, then the second moments later, when he deflected the ball with his foot and wouldn't give it up promptly to referee Pat Fraher.

"Trae Young received his first unsportsmanlike technical foul for throwing the ball at a game official," Williams told a pool reporter after the game.

Williams was then asked why Young got the second technical.

"He received his second unsportsmanlike technical foul for kicking the ball away and making a mockery of the game as we were attempting to shoot the free throw for the first technical foul, and, by rule when the player receives two unsportsmanlike fouls he's ejected from the game," Williams said.

The Hawks were down by 22 at the time, and went on to lose 120-95. And postgame, Young said he did what he did to make a statement on behalf of his teammates, like Dyson Daniels, in a game where the Hawks thought it wasn't an even whistle.

"Sometimes, when I take my frustration out on the refs, it's not just for me," Young said. "It's for my teammates. I see Dyson Daniels going; he may not be a household name yet, but he deserves the same amount of respect as some of these other guys. If you see a foul, you should call a foul. That's pretty much all it was for me."

Orlando was whistled for 25 personal fouls to Atlanta's 18 in the game, and the Hawks took 34 free throws while the Magic took 27.

"They're a physical team. I've had two teammates hurt this year in one game against them," Young said. "I'm not going to call them dirty players, or anything like that. I think they have a lot of talented players. But, a lot of the plays and the moments ... it's not even necessarily basketball at that point. I think that's where the frustration came from."

The Hawks will play host to either Chicago or Miami on Friday to decide the No 8 seed in the Eastern Conference, and who will play No 1 seed Cleveland in the first round of the playoffs. The Bulls and the Heat play an elimination game in Chicago on Wednesday.

"I'm not going to let the refs frustrate me like that in our next game," Young said. "I know we've got to win, or go home, and I'm going to be ready."

Orlando, with the win, earned the No 7 seed and a first round matchup with No 2 seed Boston, the defending NBA champion.

"The importance of him keeping his cool, he addressed that already with our team," Hawks coach Quin Snyder said. "He's quick to own that, but the game was out of hand at that point anyway."

Young led all scorers with 28 points.

Banchero comes up big

Orlando's Paolo Banchero did not have a good game, statistically, in his first play-in tournament. Yet, in the first quarter on Tuesday night, the Magic's 22-year-old power forward showed he can dominate a game without making a shot.

"It was a fun game, a big-time game, a unique type of challenge," said Banchero, after Orlando beat the Hawks. "I was interested to see how they were going to try to guard me. You could tell in the first quarter, I was trying to get my teammates involved, moving the ball, and those guys got going. They carried us throughout the game."

The statistical honors in Tuesday's win over Atlanta went to the Magic's Cole Anthony, who scored 26 points, and Anthony Black, who added 16. Both finished with plus-minus differentials of 32 and 34, respectively.

"When I saw that they were doubling up and trapping, I knew that guys were going to get open looks," said Banchero, who finished with 17 points, nine rebounds, seven assists and a plus-18.

Orlando coach Jamahl Mosley saw Banchero contribute in other ways.

"They were loading up on him, and he was trying to find the right passes, and trying to get after it defensively," Mosley said. "I think there's little pieces of the game that go unseen, but because of how teams were playing him, he was able to make the right plays at the right time."

Especially in the first quarter. Banchero led the Magic to a 32-17 advantage without making a shot. In the first 12 minutes, he had five rebounds and five assists, and made seven of eight free throws.

"What carried me tonight was getting to the free throw line," he said. "I was able to knock down most of my free throws, which kept me in rhythm, even though I didn't have a good night shooting."

Agencies via Xinhua