The Timberwolves suffered a 120-109 upset to the Lakers on Sunday and Anthony Edwards wasn’t happy at all with the free throw disparity against his team.
The T-Wolves typically shoot upwards of 23 free throws per game, but were only awarded 13 free throws against LA.
Big man Anthony Davis shot 13 free throws alone, to bring the Lakers’ total free throw attempts to 29 and this didn’t go unnoticed by Edwards.
“It’s tough every night, you know, when we don’t get to the free-throw line as much as the other team. When one player shoots more free throws than your entire team, it’s tough,” Edwards said. “It’s tough to compete. In the fourth quarter, when you miss a shot and they go to the free-throw line every time down the floor… It’s tough, man. I tip my hat to my teammates, my coaches, we just have to go out there and fight every night.”
The free throws helped Davis record a monster scoreline, which totalled 27 points, 25 rebounds, five assists, seven steals, and three blocks.
The Timberwolves best scorer went on to detail how the no calls mess with your head.
“It’s hard not to [get down]. For any player, ’cause you want to compete,” Edwards said. “If every time they get the ball and we so-called foul them and they get to the free-throw line, it’s tough. I don’t know how to explain it, man. We want to compete out there and play without the foul calls, for sure.
“It gets in your mind on offense. Throughout the whole game, the stuff that they tell us – the reason why it is a foul and why it’s not a foul – it’s crazy to us, for sure.”
Edwards recounted one incident from the game where he thought it should have been a clear foul.
“I think I asked one of the refs today,” Edwards said. “‘I’m driving the ball and he smacks my arm, I know you heard it, is it not a foul?’ And he told me, ‘No’. I said, ‘So what you calling for them?’ And I just let the conversation [go] on. Great game, great refs tonight, see you out there.”
Ant was careful not to blatantly disrespect the refereeing or go too far with his commentary.
The same can’t be said for his teammate Rudy Gobert, who was fined $100K for his comments about about the referees in a seperate game.