{"id":586147,"date":"2026-04-15T17:59:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T17:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/586147\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T17:59:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T17:59:07","slug":"lamelo-ball-punches-team-mascot-hugo-after-hornets-knock-out-heat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/586147\/","title":{"rendered":"LaMelo Ball punches team mascot Hugo after Hornets knock out Heat"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) \u2014 LaMelo Ball was so excited after delivering a knockout blow to the Miami Heat in Tuesday night\u2019s electric 127-126 play-in tournament win<\/a> that he carried it over to his victory celebration, delivering two right-hand jabs<\/a> to the oversized head of Hugo, the Charlotte Hornets\u2019 mascot.<\/p>\n

In a wild sequence, Ball avenged two critical mistakes just seconds earlier by scoring on a driving right-handed layup<\/a> with 4.7 seconds left, and Charlotte prevailed after Miles Bridges blocked Davion Mitchell\u2019s layup attempt on the other of the court as time expired. That set off a wild celebration on the court involving players, coaches and fans as the team earned its first home postseason win in a decade<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ball celebrated at midcourt, flexing after the winning layup. Local television station WBTV caught video of the hyped point guard delivering two seemingly playful blows at Hugo before embracing teammate Coby White in a bear hug. Hugo simply walked away.<\/p>\n

Ball was the center of attention all night, and it remained uncertain if he could face disciplinary action from the league ahead of Charlotte\u2019s next play-in game on Friday night after it appeared he took a swipe at the leg of Bam Adebayo early in the second quarter, causing the Heat center to fall on his back.<\/p>\n

Ball was not called for a foul and play continued. Adebayo did not return because of a lower back injury, playing just 11 minutes.<\/p>\n

Afterward, Miami coach Erik Spoelstra said Ball should have been ejected<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ball apologized after the game and said he was disoriented on the play after getting hit in the head seconds before on a drive to the basket.<\/p>\n

The ninth-seeded Hornets play on the road against the loser of Wednesday\u2019s night game between Orlando and Philadelphia as they look to snap a 10-year playoff drought.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe drew up a good play, I feel like. Just orchestrated it and it worked,\u201d Ball said of the winning shot.<\/p>\n

Ball was not asked about punching the mascot after the game; the video of it had not surfaced at that point.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe crowd was amazing,\u201d Ball said of the sold-out crowd. \u201cEveryone who came out today was real loud, so it was a good crowd.\u201d<\/p>\n

Charlotte was able to get to overtime after White hit an off-balanced 3-pointer from the corner with 10.8 seconds left to tie the game, and Miami\u2019s Tyler Herro missed a jumper at the end of regulation.<\/p>\n

The Hornets surrendered a five-point lead in OT behind two Ball blunders.<\/p>\n

After Herro drained a turnaround 3 in the corner, Ball turned the ball over at midcourt and then fouled Herro on a 3-point attempt. Herro made all three free throws to briefly give Miami a 126-125 lead, setting up Ball\u2019s theatrics on an inbounds play.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just stayed together throughout it all, it was an up-and-down game. But that\u2019s what the play-in is about,\u201d Bridges said. “… We did a great job executing on offense, LaMelo did a great job getting a layup, and then we executed on defense on the other end.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP NBA: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/NBA<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) \u2014 LaMelo Ball was so excited after delivering a knockout blow to the Miami Heat…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":586148,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[8910,402,11949,19802,60836,21016,2822,2808,25179,8173,79566,355,1063,13331,3508,2256,99,24324,56241],"class_list":{"0":"post-586147","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-bam-adebayo","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-charlotte-hornets","11":"tag-coby-white","12":"tag-davion-mitchell","13":"tag-erik-spoelstra","14":"tag-fl-state-wire","15":"tag-florida","16":"tag-lamelo-ball","17":"tag-miami-heat","18":"tag-miles-bridges","19":"tag-nba","20":"tag-nba-basketball","21":"tag-nba-playoffs","22":"tag-nc-state-wire","23":"tag-north-carolina","24":"tag-sports","25":"tag-sports-transactions","26":"tag-tyler-herro"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}