OKLAHOMA CITY — Indiana Pacers Coach Rick Carlisle crossed the practice court Sunday and smirked when he realized a line of video cameras and cellphones was tracking his every step. “There’s nothing exciting going on over here,” he said.

Scott Foster may be the NBA's only active celebrity referee. The official's poor reputation with players—they voted him the league's worst referee in a 2023 poll taken by The Athletic—has won him a kind of cult notoriety.

Indiana coach Rick Carlisle offered an impassioned and somewhat unprompted defense of referee Scott Foster on Sunday, evidently aware of the mountains of online criticism that came after Game 4 of the NBA Finals.