The NBA has rescinded Luka Dončić‘s 16th technical foul, allowing him to play in the Los Angeles Lakers’ game against the Detroit Pistons on Monday (3/23) at Little Caesars Arena.
Dončić picked up his 16th technical foul of the season on Saturday (3/21) against the Orlando Magic after getting into a back-and-forth with Goga Bitadze.
During his postgame media session with journalists after the Lakers defeated the Magic on a Luke Kennard 3-pointer with 0.6 seconds left in regulation, Dončić said Bitaze told him he would “f— my whole family.”
“Obviously, I let my team down getting that last tech. But honestly, I wasn’t trying to. He said at the free throw that he would f— my whole family,” Dončić said. “And at some point, this is a basketball court, and at some point, I can’t stand … I’ve got to stand up for myself. But I know I’ve got to do better. My teammates, I know they have my back. So, I let them down today. But hopefully, it’ll get rescinded.”
In a phone interview with ESPN and the Orlando Sentinel, Bitadze said Dončić swore at him in Serbian first and repeated the same curse back.
“I have all the respect for Luka and what he has done,” Bitadze said. “And I really respect everybody’s family. Where I come from, it’s really sacred and we really respect each other’s families, and I would never directly say that. He just said some inappropriate things in the Serbian language, which, I played in Serbia, I understand. I don’t know if he knew I understood what he said. So, I just said it back. And it was nothing towards his family or anybody. His family, I really, truly respect them.
“He said something about my mother, which, it’s really inappropriate. We don’t say that stuff during the game. … So I just said whatever he told me or [about] my mother [and] said it back. It was just in the heat of the moment. I heard what he said, and I felt like I had to respond the same way. So, from my side, if he feels like I said something too much or crossed the line, I apologize as a man. I can take [accountability], but I didn’t say anything, but what he said.”
In his first full season with the Lakers, Dončić leads the NBA in points per game. He’s averaging 33.4 points per contest while shooting 47.6% from the field, 36.7% from 3 and 77.0% from the free-throw line.
The Lakers (46-25) are in third place in the Western Conference, while the Pistons (51-19) are in first place in the Eastern Conference.
Detroit beat Los Angeles back on December 30, 2025, by a final score of 128-106.
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