On Tuesday, the Phoenix Suns’ Tyson Chandler threw down a buzzer-beating, posterizing, not-offensive goaltending alley-oop dunk against the Grizzlies and then almost knocked out a few excited fans with his celebratory punches! The reason why the play wasn’t called for offensive goaltending is that the rule doesn’t apply when you are inbounding the ball.
I bet you didn’t know that.
“I told our guy to shoot the ball in the basket and all Tyson has to do is touch it on the way down or grab the rim and have it hit your knuckle and go in,” Said Coach Jay Triano said about the final play.
Frustrated Grizzlies coach J.B. Bickerstaff had this to say about it:
“It is what it is.”
Besides being a pretty awesome game-winner that produced some amusing photos that Brandon Wright probably won’t want to look at, it was also a payback play.
Back in 2015, the two teams were tied at 93 with 0.8 seconds left in the game, but the Grizzlies were the team inbounding, and they were on their home court. Courtney Lee threw an inbound lob to Jeff Green, who dunked it in the same spot Chandler made his game-winning dunk with 0.6 seconds left.
And if you think Wright is going to hate being reminded of Chandler’s game-winner, here’s what happened to the Suns’ Jon Leur in the final two minutes of the 2015 game: he misses his 8th shot out of 11 attempts, fouls Marc Gasol with a minute left, misses two free throws with 13 seconds left and then ended up on a poster as Jeff Green dunked in the game-winner at the buzzer.
THE REAL TY CRANE
HBD @TysonChandler
The NBA Champion & DPOY was the 2nd pick in the 2001 NBA Draft after averaging 25 PTS, 15 REB, 8 BLK and leading his HS team to a state championship.He’s also the inspiration for the COACH CARTER character Ty Crane.pic.twitter.com/1yrW7zoTxE
— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) October 1, 2023
Back to Compton legend Tyson Chandler, I bet you also didn’t know he was the inspiration for the COACH CARTER character Ty Crane.
Most also forget that Chandler was the Clippers’ 2nd overall pick in the 2001 NBA Draft right out of high school, where he averaged 26 points, 15 rebounds, and 8 blocks on his way to a state championship. He was sent to Chicago in a trade for No. 1 pick Elton Brand and it was in Chi-Town where this hilarious story happened.
19-year-old Tyson Chandler & Eddy Curry were so excited to be on the same court with KG.
KG: “These high school motherf***** think they can f*** with me. F that. I’m mothef**** ticket!”
And this was preseason 😂@QRich | #KnuckleHeadspic.twitter.com/mz83ZMgkrn
— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) January 9, 2023
My favorite Tyson story is probably this one about him going against “Super Crip”
𝐀𝐋𝐋 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐌𝐎𝐊𝐄’𝐒 𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐒𝐓 𝐇𝐈𝐓𝐒: 𝐃𝐀𝐘 𝟏𝟔⁰
Tyson Chandler had no clue he was matched up against Super Crip 🤣ALL THE SMOKE with the 2011 NBA Champion is available on our YouTube! pic.twitter.com/qGAgSM4sqv
— All the Smoke (@allthesmokeprod) August 6, 2025
And I can’t say I believe in the story about him touching the top of the backboard.
It was rumored that 7'1 @tysonchandler could touch the top of the backboard in high school. #hoopmixtape pic.twitter.com/MGdWVak9eJ
— Hoopmixtape.com (@Hoopmixtape) March 4, 2019