Unsurprisingly, Rick Carlisle was unhappy after his Indiana Pacers blew Game 3 to the Boston Celtics.
The Pacers head coach fired back at a reporter, not letting the question even finish after being reminded of his team squandering an eight-point lead with less than three minutes to play at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Saturday.
“I just rewatched the ending, so you don’t need to remind me — I saw everything that happened,” Carlisle interjected. “There were a lot of things out there I disagreed with that I think any Indiana fan would disagree with.”
A reporter began to add a follow-up, but Carlisle again interrupted the question.
“Everything, everything that happened,” he said.
The Pacers led by as many as 18 points as late as the third quarter before allowing a Celtics comeback late in the game.
The comeback was concluded by a late Jrue Holiday steal as the Celtics took the lead 112-111, leading to what became two game-sealing free throws, finishing off the Pacers 114-111.
“I guess, from my perspective, I thought I beat him to the spot,” Holiday said of the steal on Andrew Nembhard. “If anything, we were chest to chest. And then the ball was out, it was just a little tap on his left hand. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I need to look at it again, but I didn’t think there was that much contact. But everything happened so fast.”
Game 4 will be on Monday, where the Celtics look to complete a sweep of the series, which would give them their second Eastern Conference C=championship in the past three years.