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The NBA announced Thursday afternoon that the league is denying the Dallas Mavericks protest stemming from a loss to the Golden State Warriors on March 22. The protest by the Mavs and Mark Cuban was over an alleged mistake made on the referees part, where the Mavericks felt they weren't given proper notice of whose possession it was out of a timeout. 

The confusion led to the Warriors scoring an uncontested basket while all five members of the Mavericks were on the other end of the floor, thinking they were getting the ball after the timeout.

Here's the play in question:

After reviewing the play, the league decided that the Mavericks couldn't prove that the possession prevented them from winning the game.

Per the NBA:

"...The incident occurred with nearly 14 minutes remaining in the game, and Dallas thereafter took the lead twice in the final four minutes.  Under these circumstances, Dallas was not able to show -- as required under the standard for NBA game protests -- that it was deprived of a fair opportunity to win the game, and the protest failed on that basis alone."

In addition to denying Dallas' protest, the league also cleared up statements made by team owner Mark Cuban following the 127-125 loss. Cuban took to Twitter to say that the referees had originally signaled that it was the Mavericks ball prior to the timeout, but then changed the call during the timeout without informing Dallas. However, the league said in its statement that Cuban's comments were "inaccurate" and that in Dallas' formal, written protest the team agreed that the referees did signal that it was Golden State's ball. Though the league denied Dallas protest, it did agree that the situation could've been handled better.

While the Mavericks were clearly confused on that possession, it wasn't the reason that Dallas lost that game. As has been the case in many of the Mavericks recent losses, defense was the main culprit. With just two games left in the regular season, and the Mavericks sitting on the outside looking in of the play-in round, they have bigger problems to worry about than a miscommunication in a loss that they had plenty of chances to win.