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Rick Pitino Preaches ‘Ethics’ While Blasting College Basketball Referees Over Controversial Finish

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Rick Pitino Ethics Referee College Basketball
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Rick Pitino may not be the best person to preach about ethics in college basketball. The legendary head coach was involved in multiple high-profile scandals (even involving the FBI) during his time at Louisville so there is a large dose of irony with his comments after Thursday night’s loss at the Baha Mar Hoops – Bahamas Championship.

He presented a rather unkind review of the officials!

St. John’s and Baylor played into double overtime during what is the early frontrunner for Game of the Year and nearly every statistical category was identical— from top to bottom. Both teams shot better than 40% from the field and more than 50% from beyond the arc. They finished with exactly 41 rebounds and 22 assists each.

Even though the Red Storm made 54.8% of their shots and at one point led by as many as 18 points, it lost by one on an epic buzzer-beater. Fifth-year senior Jeremy Roach drained the game-winner for the Bears after spending his first four years at Duke.

It was epic.

However, there is some controversy regarding the clock. It did not appear to start on time.

Rick Pitino was more upset with what happened right before that rebound. St. John’s forward Zuby Ejiofor was fouled with 4.1 seconds left on the clock. Baylor head coach Scott Drew asked the officials to review the play, because he believed that Ejiofor actually elbowed his player in the face— which would flip the call onto the Red Storm.

Don Dally, Lamar Simpson and Lucas Santos obliged. They went over the scorer’s table for a review that was not insignificant in length. It did not result in a change. The call on the floor stood.

Ejiofor went to the line with St. John’s leading 98-96 and missed both shots. Roach hit the game-winner.

Pitino was furious with the review and believes it iced his free throw shooter.

I don’t know what to say. The referees didn’t do a very good job tonight. Icing my free throw shooter there at the end was totally unethical. You can’t do something like that.

— Rick Pitino

He doubled down on the ethics comment.

Highly unethical. The referee should have never let it happen.

— Rick Pitino

Considering Rick Pitino’s past, which involved one of the biggest scandals in college basketball history, his voice on “ethics” may not be the most judicious. That does not make him any less upset with how things played out in the Bahamas.