Celtics’ Hoop Ruled Too Tall After Complaints During Pregame Warmups

Game 3 of the NBA Finals was nearly played under unusual circumstances.

There’s a pivotal scene in the classic 1992 movie White Men Can’t Jump where the two main characters, Sidney Deane and Billy Hoyle, try to settle an argument by betting whether or not Billy can successfully pull off a dunk. After his first attempt fails, he looks gobsmacked at the basket and asks a critical question: “Is this s— regulation?”

Sidney jumps up to grab the rim and deduces that it is, in fact, regulation. It doesn’t appear that Billy was on the scene ahead of Wednesday night’s Game 3 of the NBA Finals, but thankfully somebody was present at the TD Garden to ask that all-important question.

During pre-game warm-ups, a Warriors assistant coach noticed something off about one of the baskets. After bringing it to officials’s attention, it was determined that the hoop was, in fact, a few inches too tall.

The Warriors' warmups had to be paused ahead of Game 3 of the #NBAFinals because ... the hoop was too high 😲

(via @NBCSWarriors) pic.twitter.com/ll6VNUsc5e

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) June 8, 2022

Breaking out a stepladder and measuring stick is a much more official way of determining a basket’s true height, so maybe Billy was right all along. Nevertheless, it’s a good thing such a blunder was caught in time, because who knows how a slightly-too-tall hoop could have swayed a consequential game in the series.

The pause lasted only a few minutes, allowing the team to resume warm-ups in a timely fashion. While this is certainly an unusual occurrence, let’s hope that pre-game hoop height checks become the norm for this series going forward, just to be safe.