The New Orleans Pelicans and Sacramento Kings game got really weird

Last night’s game between the New Orleans Pelicans and Sacramento Kings ended up playing out a little weirder than usual. As the first half came to a close, E’Twaun Moore hit a basket, but the Pelicans entered halftime down three points. Everything initially seemed normal.

Then, in one of the strangest moments to occur in recent memory, Moore’s basket was waived off.

Apparently the refs had lost track of the number of fouls that had taken place forcing them to reward the Kings free throws they originally didn’t receive. This meant the final 10 seconds of the first half had to be replayed before they could start the third quarter.

The results to this madness was the Pelicans going into halftime down seven points instead of three. Not a huge margin but a slight increase none the less.

This is one of the stranger moments to happen in recent memory. Refs aren’t perfect, but it’s very rare for them to have a screw up to the level where an entire part of the game has to be replayed. The results of the replay ended up not changing too much, and the Pelicans went on to lose their eighth straight. So in the end it probably didn’t rewrite history, but what if something major had happened in the replayed 10 seconds?

Injuries

Imagine both teams come out of halftime ready to start the third quarter, but now they have to play a hectic final 10 seconds with nothing more than a warmup under their belts. These are professionals, but throwing them out of sync can lead to crazy results. Let’s say the Kings go out to take their free throws, but one of them misses and in the scrum of that a key player such as Anthony Davis or E’Twaun Moore gets injured. The Pelicans are already annoyed enough to have Moore’s original basket waived off, and now they just had a key player get injured in a weird situation. The league would have had a lot to answer to if that were the case.

The Pelicans take the lead

Crazier things have happened. The Kings could have potentially missed both free throws, and this time the Pelicans take advantage of their opportunity by running a designed play Alvin Gentry drew up during the halftime break. They hit an open three pointer, force a turnover, and then hit another shot before the 10 seconds is up. It’s crazy and probably not happening, but what if? Momentum shifts, and the second half goes differently.

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DeMarcus Cousins does literally anything

That the Kings were involved in a game where the ending of a quarter had to be replayed shouldn’t shock any of us. Dysfunction and weird events follow this franchise wherever it goes, and last night they brought it with them to New Orleans. Naturally, they have the most unpredictable player in the NBA in DeMarcus Cousins. With him involved anything could have happened in those 10 seconds ranging from a burst of scoring, to an ejection from the game. Long live Boogie.