Cavs/Magic Game 5 (Beta)

As I go through the NBA rule book in preparation for the finals, I decided to post my foul observations for the rest of the Eastern/Western Conference finals so that I can get an idea about where I should take this, and so that you the reader can offer any advice in how I should go about this endeavor.

So without further ado......

1st Quarter
7:03 Ilgauskas called for barely touching Turkoglu.
3:29 Varejao lightly pushes Howard near the top of the 3- point line.
2:20 Gibson barely bumps Johnson and gets a foul.
1:34 No call on blocking foul against James (Consistency?)

2nd Quarter
11:37 Wally gets a T for pushing Howard away in frustration (Refs freak out)
10:37 Pietrus and Lebron both go after the ball, Pietrus nailed for a tiny push.
9:33 Howard called for slight contact against Lebron. Must be nice to be king.
9:00 Lebron makes pretty decent contact with Gortat, yet gets no call (consistency?)
7:51 West swings wildly at Lewis to try to block his layup, barely touches his head.
7:03 This time Anthony gets called for slight contact against West.
2:18 Ilgauskas barely touches bumps Howard, gets called for it.

3rd Quarter
7:50 Refs call Alston for a clear path foul on James, even though he is clearly to the side of James.

4th Quarter
11:15 Refs call Shot clock violation even though the ball clearly goes out of bounds at 2 seconds
6:58 Refs call a push foul on Z against Howard, You do not call that foul in the 4th quarter of a elimination game.

Over all there were 52 personal fouls called (27 for the Magic and 25 for the Cavs). Howard fouled out for the magic while Varejao and Ilgauskas fouled out for the Cavs. A couple T's that were warranted (Van Gundy going onto the court to argue) and unwarranted (Szczerbiak's light frustration push against Howard).

Tonight both teams shot a combined 146 2 pointers, 43 3's and 75 FT's.

Overall not nearly as atrocious as the fourth quarter barrage of T's in Den/LA, but the officiating tonight was still lackluster and very jumpy in terms of contact at the rim. At this stage of the series the officials need to make it a priority to bring those FT numbers down in order let the game be decided 5 on 5, not from the charity stripe.