Fun fact: Pablo “Pepperoni” Prigioni had, prior to this game, made only five free throws over the whole season. His unwillingness to draw contact is understandable; he is, after all, a very old person in NBA terms (38 years old), plus he’s a Euro from South America which automatically makes him soft. There’s no way he’s going to charge directly at tall American defenders just to go to the foul line. That would be suicide. He could do that maybe two or three times before he hit the floor and all his limbs popped off and scattered in different directions.
Pepperoni doesn’t help teams by drawing fouls. He helps teams by depositing puddles of his “savvy juice” all over the locker room and by spraying it out of his savvy pores all over his teammates. That’s why he’s still in the league. It’s like the “Secret Stuff” in Space Jam but this is real life.