Nikola Jokic popped to his feet and angrily confronted Lu Dort after the Thunder forward tripped him during the Nuggets’ overtime loss Friday night at rival Oklahoma City.
The three-time league MVP said afterward it was a “necessary” response to a play that earned Dort an ejection from the game early in the fourth quarter at Paycom Center.
“It’s an unnecessary move and a necessary reaction,” Jokic said after the 127-121 loss to the defending NBA champions. “There is no such thing — I think there’s not supposed to be those things on a basketball floor. “So, it was just an unnecessary move and a necessary reaction by me.”
Jokic and OKC center Jaylin Williams also were assessed double technical fouls on the play in the confrontation between the sides that went to seven games in the second round of last year’s Western Conference playoffs before the Thunder eventually secured the NBA title.
It was ruled via review that Dort’s foul was a flagrant 2 — resulting in automatic ejection — after replays showed he backed into Jokic as they ran up the court and stuck out his right foot to trip the eight-time All-Star.
Jokic bounced up and angrily bumped chests with Dort before Williams stepped in and traded shoves and jersey grabs with the Denver center.
Coaches and officials then broke up the ensuing on-court scrum.
“Just competing,” Williams told ESPN. “Two teams competing, that’s it. That’s all I got.”
Crew chief James Williams told a pool reporter after the game that the refs deemed Dort’s contact “to be unnecessary and excessive with a high potential for injury.”
OKC coach Mark Daigneault seemed to suggest that the ruling was based on Jokic’s status among the league’s best players.
“I will say this: If [Williams] is running up the floor and gets tripped, we expect a flagrant 2 from this point forward,” Daigneault said. “That’s all. If that’s the precedent, if that becomes a malicious play and flagrant 2 is the line in the sand on that, we would expect that if it’s [Williams]. We would expect that if it’s anybody. And if that’s the case, we’re good.”
The game also featured the return to the Thunder lineup for reigning MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who had 36 points and nine assists in 34 minutes after sitting out the previous nine games due to an abdominal strain.
The teams will meet again March 9 in Oklahoma City.
