The morning of the Hue Hollins game, I told someone in my dept. at work that even though the NBA wouldn’t announce its refs until later in the day due to betting, that Hue Hollins and his crew would do the game and there would be a critical call at the end to cost the Bulls. That call was far from the worst call. There was an amazing call at the end of the first half that kept Ewing in the game and turned an 8-pt. Bull lead into about a 3-pt. lead at half. There were many others. It was a joke. Don’t forget Hollins also made bad calls in one of the last games of a later season to cost the Bulls a 9-loss season, and so they would end up 72-10. There were other games in that Bull-Knick series that were also stolen from the Bulls. In one game, they had a 14-point lead, I believe, Pippen would take shots and get thrown into the stands, and there was no call.
I think the conversation regarding the Laker-King game is funny. I watched that series and was very vocal to everyone I know that the Kings were the first team in NBA history to win 6 games in a 7-game series. The game they are talking about was a joke, and there was obviously something going on. I said this throughout the series. However, the real joke was the game that the Lakers won at the end when Divac (of the Kings) batted a loose ball inbounds instead of out of bounds, and it went to Robert Horry who hit a three at the buzzer to win. In that game, the Kings were up by about 18 at half and had the momentum, but they allowed a 3-point shot (by Horry, I believe) well after the halftime buzzer. It cut the lead and gave the Lakers momentum. It was ridiculous, as were many other calls during that game. I’ve maintained from that point on, and have discussed this many times over the years, that that series was fixed. I will never forget one of the King players making a comment during the offseason, and Shaq stating publicly that the Kings had nothing to say since the Lakers beat them. How he could say that the Lakers beat them has always amazed me, as any player on either team in that series had to know the Lakers were given 3 of their wins by the refs.