CHICAGO -- Fans at United Center may have reveled in Bulls forward Derrick Jones Jr.'s flagrant foul on Milwaukee Bucks guard Grayson Allen on Friday night, but Jones insisted afterward that the foul was not intentional and denied being a dirty player.
Jones was given a flagrant foul 1 in the fourth quarter after delivering a hip check while trying to defend Allen on a drive to the basket and hitting Allen in the face with his elbow.
Jones said he was simply trying to "get a stop."
"That's all that goes through my head," Jones said after the game. "I'm not a dirty player. Honestly, I talked to every ref that was there today. I didn't think that was a flagrant. They said I hit him in his head. I didn't even feel it. I just felt him bump my hip and fall. That's all I felt."
Allen had been the subject of ire by Chicago fans all evening and was serenaded by boos from the sold-out crowd of 21,259 every time he touched the ball.
On Jan. 21, the last time the Bulls and Bucks matched up against each other, Allen committed a flagrant foul 2 on Alex Caruso, which resulted in Caruso suffering a fractured right wrist. Caruso has not played since.
It was the first time Allen had been called for a flagrant foul this season, and only the second time in his NBA career.
However, the Bucks were ready to put the incident behind them leading up to Friday's rematch, and none of their players took issue afterward with Jones' hard foul on Allen.
Jones maintained that he did not try to exact revenge for the play in January.
"I ain't even tripping off that. It's basketball," Jones said. "I want to get a stop as much as they want to get a stop on the other end. What happened in Milwaukee, we didn't like it. It's obvious we didn't like it. Nobody liked that. But I mean I'm not going to go out there and just try to take a man out.
"That's not who I am. If I get a foul in the process of trying to get a stop, then so be it. But I ain't [gonna] blatantly take that man out. He got a family to take care of. Why would I do that?"