In the final minutes of the Toronto-Liberty game, Betnijah Laney-Hamilton appeared to throw a shoe at Tempo guard Marina Mabrey. The fiery guard tried to retaliate and was held back by Sabrina Ionescu as officials stepped in. They assessed it as a technical for Laney-Hamilton and ejected her. Everyone was left puzzled, and Mabrey’s sister Dara took to social media, while the Liberty guard revealed why she tossed the shoe.
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“I would never intentionally try to hit someone with a shoe, especially while they’re not looking. Teammate was without a shoe, so I did my best to try and get it to her. Unfortunately, it did hit someone,” Laney-Hamilton said postgame as per New York Post’s Madeline Kenney.
That was when Dara Mabrey posted on social media about where the shoe even came from: “Where did the shoe go in between from when it was under the basket and then to Marina’s back?” she posted on X.
WNBA page Shabazz posted a clip from the broadcast which showed Jonquel Jones lose her shoe just below the New York Liberty’s basket during a sequence before the shoe-toss.
However, the cameras didn’t capture what exactly happened after that. Regardless, Laney-Hamilton remained apologetic about the incident.
“I know just by the way that things were going throughout the game that it can look a certain way, but that’s just not something that I would personally do… especially in a moment like that where the game is on the line.”
Betnijah Laney-Hamilton was referring to the fact that she was already on a flagrant 1 after making contact with Mabrey’s face, and how that may have made it look as though she intentionally threw the shoe at Mabrey, as the Liberty were on the verge of losing.
However, even Liberty boss Chris DeMarco backed Laney-Hamilton, saying she wasn’t trying to hit Mabrey. But he also criticized the officials for their handling of the game. “It was just an atrocious, atrocious end of that game from officials.”
While Mabrey was ready to retaliate when the incident happened on the court, even she agreed that the fellow guard didn’t throw the shoe at her with malice. “I think she was really just trying to get the shoe back to JJ,” Marina Mabrey said after the game.
Ultimately, the tensions calmed down, and the play resumed. The Tempo took home the win, holding off a fourth-quarter run from the Liberty. Despite being on the receiving end of the bizarre incident. Mabrey played a crucial role in snapping her team’s four-game losing streak, scoring 30 points in her team’s 93-91 win over New York.