Suns' Hornacek mistakenly calls out Dellavedova
DENVER — Following the Phoenix Suns‘ 101-97 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers on Monday, embattled Suns coach Jeff Hornacek criticized Cavs guard Matthew Dellavedova for provoking officials into calling a bogus offensive foul on Tyson Chandler late in the game.
Only there was one major problem with Hornacek’s critique: Dellavedova was on the bench during the play in question, when Chandler set an illegal screen on Iman Shumpert, nullifying a 3-pointer by Brandon Knight that would have turned Phoenix’s one-point deficit into a two-point lead with 46 seconds remaining.
“You see picks all game long that are illegal, and then all of a sudden they’re going to call that one, so that was a tough one right there,” Hornacek said during his opening remarks after the game. “I’m sure whether it was legal, illegal, I can guarantee Dellavedova probably pulled Tyson. It’s the trick. You watch these games on tape; he does it all the time. So I guess that’s a smart play, he suckered the guy into calling it.”
Cleveland coach David Blatt was asked about Hornacek’s erroneous statement prior to his team’s game against the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday.
“If he’s calling out a guy that wasn’t on the court, I guess that sort of says it all, doesn’t it? I don’t think I need to respond to that — that says everything in and of itself,” Blatt said.
Dellavedova’s reaction to Hornacek’s quote was similarly deadpan.
“I mean, I guess me and Shump look pretty similar,” Dellavedova said.
When asked specifically about Hornacek’s claim that he is trying to deceive the officials when he plays, Dellavedova barely dignified it with a response.
“I mean, I don’t really know what to say to that,” Dellavedova said. “Yeah, I mean, yeah. That’s interesting but, um, yeah. No real comment on it, I guess.”
During the playoffs last spring, Dellavedova had run-ins with several opposing players throughout the Cavs’ journey to the Finals. During their series with Atlanta, LeBron James was asked about Dellavedova’s “dirty reputation” and staunchly defended him, saying the native Australian gets a “bad rap” and “he doesn’t deserve it.”
Does the fact that reputation still follows him bother Dellavedova?
“No, I mean, Tyson Chandler sets good screens, but they’re not always perfectly still, but they’re still a good screen,” Dellavedova said, somewhat eluding the question while also pointing out an apparent hypocrisy in Hornacek’s criticism. “So, it’s hard to get around. It was obviously a huge play in the game. A one-point game and they made the 3 after it. But yeah, a moving screen was called [against Chandler] on Shump.”
Dellavedova, who is having a career year, averaging 9.0 points on 44.9 percent shooting from 3 to go with 5.3 assists and 2.1 rebounds per game, said he has too many responsibilities during the course of a game to focus on the referees.
“I think as a point guard you got a lot of other things to worry about,” he said. “Making sure we run our right stuff, trying to protect our defense. That’s usually the first line of defense. So, that’s the furthest thing from my mind.”
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