Sunday was a rough day at the office for Kyrie Irving.
First and foremost, the Mavericks suffered a road loss to the Hornets, who are one of only four teams already eliminated from NBA playoff contention. But before Dallas was defeated by Charlotte for the second time in three days, Irving had a heated exchange with a fan in attendance at Spectrum Center.
Irving walked to the corner of the court to confront the fan and appeared to shout “say it to my face.” The star point guard quickly removed himself from the situation and the fan was ordered to leave the game.
After the Mavericks’ fourth consecutive loss, Irving opened up about the incident.
“He just called me on my name, so I just had to make sure I looked him eye-to-eye and see if he would say it to my face,” Irving told reporters, per ClutchPoints’ Jerry Donatien. “A lot of fans say things when you’re turning your head or say it in the crowd ’cause they can get away with it. But a majority of the time, if I can look a fan in the face and see if they really wanna say it to me — he yelled, so I handled it.”
Irving and the Mavericks are on the outside looking in at the Western Conference playoff picture with seven games left on their regular-season schedule. Dallas entered Monday one game removed from the West’s final play-in spot.
