The Toronto Raptors are straight up not having a good time this season. They have struggled to win games this year, despite the efforts of some of their players. Their last game was loss to the Boston Celtics that could've swung in their favor, but ultimately did not go their way. That game featured one of the more bizarre interactions during a game, as head coach Nick Nurse tried to challenge… a jump ball.
After the game, Nick Nurse revealed what exactly happened during that interaction to Vivek Jacob and Oren Weisfeld. The Raptors said that one of the referees confirmed to him that he could challenge the jump ball call IF he called a timeout. However, once he called the timeout, another referee stepped in to say that was not possible, but still charged the timeout.
Nick Nurse said he was told by one ref that he could challenge the jump ball IF he called a timeout so he called it. Then the other ref said he cannot challenge the jump ball but it was taken from him anyways. He is disappointed with how it was legislated.
— Oren Weisfeld (@OrenWeisfeld) January 22, 2023
Nurse says he asked ref Michael Smith if he could challenge the jump ball and Smith said he could if he called timeout, so Nurse said ok timeout. Then Ed Malloy came over and said you can't challenge a jump ball so Nurse said ok no timeout then, Smith then said no you called it
— Vivek Jacob (@vivekmjacob) January 22, 2023
That is… bizarre. This interaction seemed to happen before the timeout was even called, which means that the referees had time to reverse the timeout. What makes it even more weird was that the referee who told the Raptors coach that he could challenge it was the one that also said that they couldn't reverse the timeout call.
Some of the blame will go to Nurse for not knowing the rules, and that's completely fair. Regardless, blaming the Raptors' loss to the Celtics on this one play is fruitless. Toronto had every chance to put away the injured Boston team for good, but failed to capitalize. This will be yet another loss in a season full of different ways the Raptors lost to different opponents.