Goga Bitadze suffers embarrassing ejection after heated Kristaps Porzingis altercation

It was a moment that moved from drama to comedy. 

Magic center Goga Bitadze taunted Celtics forward Kristaps Porzingis thinking the Latvian hooper was being ejected, only to find out that he was the one being kicked out of their teams’ game in Orlando, Fla., after a fourth-quarter altercation between the two.

The Orlando big man seemed to grab at Porzingis’ throat, and Magic teammate Jalen Suggs bearhugged Porzingis to keep things from escalating at Kia Center on Monday.

Moments later, Bitadze seemed to think Porzingis was getting shown the door early and started taunting him from the Magic bench, but he was quickly made aware that he had been ejected. 

One of his teammates looked back at him and seemed to tell him what the situation was. 

A shocked look then came across Bitadze’s face, and he seemingly asked if he was the one ejected and then starts to walk away dejectedly. 

Bitadze finished the game with eight points, nine rebounds and three assists before he was kicked out. 

Porzingis and Suggs both received technical fouls from the incident, but Porzingis didn’t think the whole situation was all that serious in the end. 

“Just competing. Started talking a little bit, and we went face-to-face, and we just kept on talking,” Porzingis said to reporters about it. “And Bitadze came from the side and kind of shoved me. Of course, I reacted to that. Just a normal, some NBA action. Nothing serious, just competing and it’s good that nobody got thrown out from our side. We just kept playing.”

The Magic ended up holding on for a close 108-104 win over the defending NBA champions. 

Trevelin Queen finished the game with 17 points for Orlando in the win.

Celtics star Jaylen Brown scored a game-high 35 points on the night.