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Illinois Girls State Playoff game Monday night. Blue trails white by 2 points with 30 seconds left on the clock and the possesion arrow pointing to Blue. Blue shoots, misses, rebound hits the floor. White grabs the ball, blue follows and grabs the ball. Lead calls the held ball.
In the meantime, White's coach, seeing that a held ball is likely, calls for a time out as soon as her player grabbed the ball. Trail hears the request and turns to verify that it is the coach. Lead comes running toward half court and announces to the entire gym that the held ball occurred prior to the TO request. White's coach loudly protests to Trail (and R) that he had to have heard her request.
After about 15 seconds, T and L get together, discuss, and ultimately grant the TO and give the ball back to white. Naturally the crowd goes crazy. Credit to Blue's coach, she protested to the officials, but never came anywhere near to crossing the line towards a T. Her assistant was also up protesting, but the officials chose to ignore her (it was during the TO, so she could be up off the bench).
I was in the stands and didn't hear the TO request, but I'm confident that if the T says he heard the request that he actually heard it. My son was sitting next to me and asked if the ref got it right. I explained that if he heard the request, they got it right. I didn't bother trying to explain to the crowd as they were already being observed by security (one parent had already been ejected) and they obviously didn't care what any official had to say.
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