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(This happened last week. One of our association crews was doing the game.) Visitors are up 70-30 late in the third quarter and pressing like crazy. The home coach tells his player on the throw-in after the last basket to throw it to the visitor pressing under the basket to give them an easy basket. This happened 3 times so quickly that the visitors scored three baskets in about 10 seconds. One of the officials hears the home coach say, "Do it again." The official T's up the home coach and as a result, the visitors stop pressing.
We discussed this at length at our officials round table and decided there were several ways to handle it. One would be to call both coaches together and tell them that there are hard feelings brewing here because of the score and the press. In this particular case it happened so fast and the official heard the coach tell his team to do it so the T was appropriate. Under the general concept of making a "mockery" or "travesty" of the game, the T was given. Now, we also discussed that the official doesn't really have the authority to tell a coach how to coach and we shouldn't tell them not to press but it could fall under the area of preventive officiating. Also, it was mentioned that it should be the responsibility of the home coach in this situation to get in the face of the other coach and tell him to knock off the press. In any case, it puts the official in a tough spot because it's not our fault that this is happening.
Any thoughts or experiences like this?
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