There was the indignity of losing to the Knicks, who had been 10 games under .500. Hey, the Nets, at 14-21, were up next for LeBron James and the two-time defending champion Heat.
But this game brought indignity to new levels for James and the champs.
James was horse-collared for a fourth quarter flagrant foul by the Nets’ Mirza Teletovic. Then James fouled out in overtime, victimized by three offensive foul calls — including No. 6, drawn by Shaun Livingston and a charging call against the Nets’ Andrei Kirilenko just before the flagrant.
“I thought Kirilenko flopped a few times to be honest about it. He flopped a few times and he got the call,” said James, who suffered his worst indignity when he watched a second overtime from the bench as the Nets emerged with a 104-95 victory, making the Heat 0-for-2 in 48 hours in Greater New York.
But the play that got James all sorts of riled was the flagrant foul by Teletovic at 8:37 of the fourth. James, who finished with 36 points, was going for a transition dunk. He appeared to elbow off Kirilenko before Teletovic grabbed him around the throat.
“I was just trying to foul, nothing else,” Teletovic said. “Nothing else. I was trying to make a stop. That was it.”
On the court, James took exception. Too much exception, Teletovic said.
“Of course. It was just a foul. I was trying to make a foul to stop him from scoring,” Teletovic said.
“He went around the neck,” James fumed. “ It’s not a basketball play.”
Of the play that finally drove him from the game, with 36 seconds left in the first OT, James admitted it was a foul; he plowed into Shaun Livingston, one of the Nets’ heroes in the unlikely affair. It was James’ first regular-season disqualification since April 2, 2008, the fourth in his career.
“I thought the last one that fouled me out could have been a charge for sure,” James said. “[Livingston] kind of put his hands on me as I drove and that got him off balance and he was able to get the call. But Kirilenko flopped on me a few times and got the call.”
So now the champs were basically the Big Red One: no James and no Dwyane Wade — who was undergoing a knee-maintenance rest night. Miami got it to a second overtime, thanks to a Norris Cole (18 points, 52 minutes) shot with 3.3 seconds left in the first overtime.
“We’re banged up right now,” James said of the Heat, who also were without the injured Shane Battier and Mario Chalmers. “We’re not an excuse team, but we had three starters that didn’t play. Even though we’ve got a lot of depth, it’s hard to make up for three starters being out.”