Donaghy letter to court alleges refs altered games

Jeff Van Gundy ultimately backed off comments that a referee told him that officials had targeted Yao Ming in the Houston Rockets 2005 first-round playoff series against the Dallas Mavericks. Maybe he was right.

A letter sent to the sentencing court on behalf of convicted former referee Tim Donaghy outlines just such a plan. Donaghy's legal team is trying demonstrate his cooperation with a government investigation before he is sentenced on July 14 on felony charges alleging he took cash payoffs from gamblers and bet on games himself.

The letter mentions only the year, but the circumstances make it apparent that it is referring to the Rockets-Mavs series.

"Team 3 lost the first two games in the series and Team 3's Owner complained to NBA officials," the letter says. "Team 3's Owner alleged that referees were letting a Team 4 player get away with illegal screens. NBA Executive Y told Referee Supervisor Z that the referees for that game were to enforce the screening rules strictly against that Team 4 player. Referee Supervisor Z informed the referees about his instructions. As an alternate referee for that game, Tim also received these instructions."

Mavs owner Mark Cuban did in fact complain after his team lost the first two games of the series, and Dallas went on to beat Houston in seven games. Van Gundy said that a working referee had told him about the league's plan. Donaghy's letter claims that Supervisor Z contacted the coach. Van Gundy was ultimately fined $100,000.

Looking at box scores from the series, however, the only game in which Yao fouled out was in fact Game 1. He did average 4.4 fouls per game in the series.

The letter also details an incident in the 2002 playoffs in which Donaghy alleges that two referees, who were known as NBA "company men," wanted to extend a series to seven games. "Team 5" could have wrapped up the series in Game 6 but lost two players to ejection, lost that game and ultimately the series.

*It is not clear which series this account refers to.

Donaghy also alleges that team executives conspired with the league to prevent star players from being called for too many fouls or being ejected. He claimed that league officials told referees that doing so would "hurt ticket sales and television ratings."

According to the letter, when an official did eject a star player in the first quarter of a game in 2000, he was privately reprimanded.

In addition to game-altering allegations, Donaghy's letter claims that many officialy carry on relationships with team exectutives, coaches and players that violate their NBA contracts.

"Tim described one referee's use of a team's practice facility to exercise and another's frequent tennis matches with a team's coach," the letter states.

The NBA has not commented on Donaghy's allegations. Donaghy's attorney and prosecutors also declined to comment to The Associated Press on Tuesday. Donaghy faces up to 33 months in prison.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=3436401

Only series that went to 7 games was the Lakers vs. Kings. [/b]