Mike Brown once again put the officials on the spot for allegedly siding with the Oklahoma City Thunder. The New York Knicks only led by one point throughout the game as OKC had 38 free throws. The Knicks’ head coach even gave a bit of a tongue-in-cheek answer when talking about the officiating and Thunder star guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

“You can’t reach because the team does a fantastic job, starting with SGA, of getting the officials to believe a foul has occurred. Their gamesmanship is off the charts. They do a great job of exploiting it, so I tip my hat off to them, said Brown to the media.

If we look closer, there is some validity to the coach’s complaint. One such instance was when Karl-Anthony Towns was given a flagrant foul despite being fouled by two Thunder players.

The Knicks committed 25 fouls, and the Thunder were called for 22 fouls. While these numbers are very close, there is a huge free-throw discrepancy. Mike Brown’s team had only 17 free throws, converting on 13 of them. But OKC had nearly double as they scored 31 from their 38 attempts. In fact, SGA was on the charity stripe 16 times.

So, the Knicks’ head coach was upset with how the calls favored OKC. Gilgeous-Alexander only scored 30 points, so half of his points were from free throws. Even Mike Brown’s efforts to plead to the officials failed. He picked up a technical foul in the third quarter and was close to an ejection because Brown almost touched the referee.

Since his efforts produced no such result, the head coach was disappointed. “You can’t waste your energy against the officials, and we did that tonight–and it still didn’t change. [They still got calls].” He acknowledged that he only had two techs all season. Coincidentally, both techs occurred in games against the Thunder.

Knicks head coach Mike Brown had a reason for calling out the referee

SGA is truly elite at initiating contact without getting tagged. Even in the reverse fixture earlier this month, there was no foul call that was not called. It would have been his third foul in the first quarter, putting him on a tight rope. So, Brown clearly knows that the current MVP can bait the calls, and it was evident today as well. But Mike Brown wanted to stand up for his players

“I mainly picked up the tech just to show my guys I’ll try to protect my guys, but that’s not where the game’s won or lost,” Brown added. “I’ll ride with you.” The intent matters because even other coaches have received technical fouls against the Thunder. Wolves head coach Chris Finch was unapologetically blunt in his assessment, and that got him in trouble. Even Indiana Pacers coach Rick Carlisle was on the receiving end of a tech.

Despite this, Brown wanted to take a stand against the officials. Unfortunately, it didn’t lead to their win as the Knicks lost two straight games. Now, they are three games behind the Celtics for the second spot in the East and just one game ahead of fourth spot.