The NBA robbed the Cleveland Cavaliers of a win, and they refused to admit it.
This isn't to say that there is some grand conspiracy against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the league office. Adam Silver has little reason to want to the Indiana Pacers to advance ahead of the Cavaliers; if it were the Lakers, sure, but the Cavs have the most marketable star and the Pacers are a small market team. The league doesn't intentionally place its finger on the scale, but if they did, this wouldn't be the time.
Yet they have failed, and in a significant way, and that is with consistently enforcing a rule -- one that has been around for a very long time, that is present at every level of organized basketball, and one that the NBA inexplicably refuses to enforce on its players.
That rule is when players are allowed to move on free throw shots. Per the league's own rulebook, a player who is positioned outside of the 3-point line cannot cross that line until the ball is released. Then, the shooter cannot move until the ball strikes the rim.
The Pacers got away with a violation twice
The Pacers committed both infractions in the final minute of their absolutely insane comeback victory, and the referees called them on neither. First, Pascal Siakam missed his second free throw with 47 seconds remaining. Pacers wing Aaron Nesmith was positioned outside of the 3-point line, took off early, and was essentially next to Siakam when he released the ball. That allowed him to beat out everyone else for an easy putback dunk.
I would show you the video clip from the NBA on his putback, but the league has removed it from the records. I can show you every other basket that Nesmith made in the game, but the final one is blank. The league knows it messed up the call, but it doesn't feel like it can admit it. Jackson Flickinger at Fear the Sword has a decent clip here.
It happened again on the most painful final play of the game. Tyrese Haliburton went to the line with the Pacers down three and only 12.4 seconds remaining. After making his first free-throw, his second was short -- and he knew it as soon as it left his hand. He moved into the lane and got himself in position for the rebound he would soon corral, leading to his game-winning 3-point shot seconds later.
The NBA released its Last 2 Minute Report that discussed every call and non-call from the final two minutes. They are willing to own up to some mistakes, even critical ones; the referees missed a foul call on Josh Hart in the final seconds of a one-point Knicks win over the Pistons earlier in the playoffs and admitted to it in the L2M report.
The NBA ducked the smoke
That level of accountability was nowhere to be found on Wednesday, when the report came out for the Cavaliers' loss to the Pacers in Game 2. Rather than acknowledged that they missed the lane violations on the Pacers' two biggest plays of the game, they instead hid behind the shield of "multiple players on both teams" committed the violations.
Players toe over the line or take a step early all of the time in the NBA. The referees just let it go. That is absolutely true, and by the letter of the law they could call a lane violation on nearly every free-throw attempt. They probably should.
Using that as cover for missing the incredibly blatant and game-shaping violation by Nembhard sprinting into the paint while Pascal Siakam still has the ball on his hands is cowardly. Their own incompetence in adjudicating the rules gave them cover to not admit their failure on a larger scale.
The Cavaliers win Game 2 if Nesmith is called for a violation on that play. He should have been - the rules are clear. The referees missed it, the Pacers scored, and they went on to win the game and take a dominating lead in the series. And the NBA wasn't man enough to admit it.