The Chet Holmgren self-lob mystery

Is it an assist? A missed shot? No one seems to know.

Dec 22, 2023

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Chet Holmgren took a page out of Tracy McGrady’s book on Thursday night. And it was glorious.

After getting stuck in a one-on-one on Ivica Zubac near the foul line, Holmgren lobbed it to himself off the backboard and smashed a two-handed jam. It was awesome.

It’s also a mystery.

Is that an assist? He was clearly passing to himself.

If so, that should be recorded as:

Chet Holmgren makes dunk (assisted by Chet Holmgren).

But I could also see it being recorded as a missed shot and putback.

Chet Holmgren misses 12-footer.

Chet Holmgren offensive rebound.

Chet Holmgren makes dunk.

I checked the play-by-play. And here’s what I found:

Huh?

Neither!?

I need to get to the bottom of this. I wanted to see how Tracy McGrady’s famous one from the 2002 All-Star game was registered in the scorebook. I know we have play-by-play data going back to 1996-97, but the T-Mac one took place in an exhibition. I looked it up.

No such luck.

Dead end.

I went searching for clues in the box score. If McGrady tallied a zero in the assist or offensive rebound column, we could eliminate those options. No dice.