Miami Heat center Hassan Whiteside and Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid got into a bit of a playful Twitter spat after Embiid outplayed Whiteside in a preseason game last October. After Whiteside outplayed Embiid in the Heat’s 108-99 win last night, there weren’t a lot of friendly words being tossed about by Embiid.
Whiteside finished with 26 points, eight rebounds and two blocks to Embiid’s 17 points and seven rebounds. That didn’t irritate Embiid as much as an exchange in the third quarter in which the two tussled as they ran back down court. Manny Navarro of the Miami Herald has more from Embiid and Whiteside on their game against each other:
Referring to a third-quarter incident in which they tussled slightly as they ran down the court, Embiid said: “He tried to hit me in the back, which is kind of dirty because of the fact that I’ve had back problems. We’re going to see about that. I won’t forget about that.”
Embiid was charged with a foul – his fourth – which sent him to the bench for the final 9:11 of the quarter.
“That fourth foul, I don’t remember touching him,” Embiid said. “Even after the replay, I don’t know what they were looking at…. I didn’t think I touched [Whiteside]. But then they called a technical foul on him because obviously he’s the one that made a dirty play… He hits really soft, so I didn’t feel anything. But just the action of him trying to like do that I think is pretty messed up.”
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Does Whiteside get motivated to play Embiid? He thought about the question for several seconds, hesitated and then offered this succinct answer: “I look towards this.”
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Embiid blamed himself instead of crediting Whiteside.
“I took too many jump shots, missed a lot of them,” he said.
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