Tristan Thompson claps back at Raptors coach with 'lottery' jab over 'classless & disrespectful' remarks

Cleveland Cavaliers center Tristan Thompson has gotten into a spat with Toronto Raptors coach Darko Rajakovic. Thompson drew the ire of the Raptors after he dunked the ball with only a few seconds remaining in the Cavaliers' 131-108 win on Wednesday.

Thompson's actions led several Raptors players to confront him after the buzzer had sounded. Later, Rajakovic spoke out against the Cavaliers center's actions during the postgame press conference, saying that it showed 'no class and was disrespectful.'

The Cavs center did not take long to respond to Rajakovic as he fired back on X (formerly Twitter).

"You wanna full court press with under a minute left in the game when you get cracked by 30 this will happen to you," Thompson tweeted. "Lose for draft lottery and be happy buddy boy. Hopefully you and most of your guys see the light at the end of Bobby and Masai long term plan. Bless up stay warm in MY CITY."

Tristan Thompson didn't break any rules by dunking but violated an "unwritten rule." Many hoopers believe that it is disrespectful to score when winning by a landslide while the clock is already close to zero.

However, not everyone adheres to this rule. There have been other instances of players scoring a basket in garbage time and it has similarly led to a confrontation. In fact, this is not the first time that the Raptors have been involved in a situation like this.

Back in 2017, the Indiana Pacers were up 105-90 with under 50 seconds left. Instead of letting the clock run out, Pacers guard Lance Stephenson scored to run up the score to 107-90. This led several Raptors players to confront Stephenson.

Similar to Tristan Thompson, Stephenson was called disrespectful and classless by the Raptors.

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Toronto Raptors coach Darko Rajakovic praises his players for confronting Tristan Thompson

Scottie Barnes and Jamal Shead seemed like they were the most heated at Tristan Thompson for dunking in garbage time. They came up to him to confront him after the final buzzer which in turn resulted in other players from either team joining in.

Coach Darko Rajakovic praised his players for confronting Thompson after he called out the Cavs center.

"I'm really glad that our guys, our players, from Jamal to Scottie and everybody else, that they stood up for themselves. I love when my team stands up for themselves," Rajakovic said.

Tristan Thompson only entered when the game was already out of hand for the Toronto Raptors. He was subbed in for Jarrett Allen with only 3:30 left in the game while the Cavs were up 122-98.

During that time, Thompson scored four points, grabbed one board and dished one assist.