Oklahoma City Thunder Player Serge Ibaka Explains Why He Karate-Chopped Blake Griffin In The Groin

Yesterday's Thunder-Clippers game was marred by an incident in the fourth quarter where OKC big man Serge Ibaka appeared to intentionally punch Blake Griffin in the groin.

The announcers and the crowd both thought Ibaka should have been ejected. After the game, Griffin agreed, saying he was surprised Ibaka was allowed to stay in the game.

Ibaka was only given a flagrant-1 foul, and the Thunder went on to win. Here's the chop (full video below):

If the refs thought it was intentional, they would have ejected Ibaka. So they obviously saw it as an accident.

That's kind of how Ibaka explained it after the game, but not entirely (via Sam Amick of USA Today):

"He hit my hands away. He's strong, so when he grabs you, your jersey or whatever, and you try to defend yourself and rebound. So maybe you can do some move, not to hurt, (but) just to get good position. But then something happens where you get hurt in the paint. It's not anything where I want to try to hurt him. I'm not that kind of person. I just try to play hard, and that's it."

So Ibaka is saying that he intentionally retaliated, but unintentionally hit him in the groin.

Based on that explanation, he probably still should have been ejected — even if it was an accident that the punch landed where it did, he threw it purposefully.

Here's the full video: