NBA Summer League snafu: Mavericks score on what looked like the wrong basket after referee's error

For a brief moment, it appeared as though the Dallas Mavericks' Marcus Bingham Jr. made one of the biggest gaffes at the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas.

During the fourth quarter against the Indiana Pacers, Bingham caught a pass from Nike Sibande and sprinted away from the rest of his team for a wide-open dunk on the opposite end of the court. In that moment everyone — from the referees to the broadcast announcers to some of his teammates — thought Bingham scored on the wrong basket. The play was blown dead and Jared Dudley, the Mavs' Summer League coach, stared in confusion.

But wait! Upon further review, Bingham was actually going in the right direction. The referees just set the play up on the wrong side of the court. And if you watch the other players close enough — especially the Pacers — it's easier to see their confusion as to why the Mavericks had the ball on their side in the first place.

Dallas wasn't even supposed to have the ball here, either. After the Mavericks hit a 3-pointer, the Pacers took a timeout at halfcourt to reset their offense. But the referee handed the ball to the Mavericks instead, which led to the weird series of events that unfolded.

Unsurprisingly, the basket did not count, the teams were positioned correctly and the Pacers got the ball back. But Bingham still wanted everyone to know he took a shot on the right hoop.

There haven't been many instances of NBA players scoring on the wrong basket during the regular season — at least not on purpose.

Most recently, then-Toronto Raptors forward Oshae Brissett tipped a defensive rebound in a 2019 game against the Boston Celtics. Some other notable accidental own-baskets came when Larry Nance Jr. threw a defensive rebound into his own bucket in 2015 when he played for the Los Angeles Lakers and when New Orleans Pelicans center Ömer Aşık tipped in an inbounds pass from the San Antonio Spurs while he defended Tim Duncan, which forced overtime in a 2014 game.

As for Friday's referee snafu, something similar actually happened to the Mavericks during the regular season this past season — with real consequences.

During a March 22 game between the Mavericks and Golden State Warriors, the referees gave the Warriors an inbound pass under the Mavericks' basket with 14 seconds left in the game. Problem was, the Dallas players thought the referees indicated they would be given position on the other end of the court. Golden State scored a free layup and ended up winning by two points.

Mavericks owner Mark Cuban later protested the game because of the mistake, which the NBA later denied.

At least this time around, the errors were quickly corrected by the officials. The Mavericks also didn't need those points either after the 112-91 win over the Pacers. Too bad it was just a Summer League game.