Last night I was Trail and observing the dribbler and his guard right in front of the visiting bench. The dribbler tries to go past him on the sideline and the guard extends his leg into the path and knocks him to the floor. I the whistle for what I think is a simple foul. At this time I hear my partner's voice from the C say "double foul."
I turn to look at him, wondering this play could possibly be that. We meet in the vertical third of the court and he tells me that he has two knuckleheads on the other side of the FT lane causing a problem and they are the two players that he is penalizing. His whistle sounded AT THE SAME TIME as mine and neither of us heard the other!
I can't just ignore the foul that I've called as the dribbler got knocked off his feet right in front of his coach. So we discuss for a bit and decide that we have a simultaneous foul which is made up of a double personal foul and a common personal foul. We are going to penalize all three players.
We awarded no FTs, charged each of the three players with personal fouls, and added one team foul to the offense and two to the defense. These were team fouls 7 and 8 for the defense and 9 for the offense in that half. We then resumed with a POI throw-in for the offense from nearest to where the dribbler was fouled, basically right in front of the coach.
Both coaches were fine with the explanation. That surprised me.
So #1 do people think that we handled it correctly?
#2 on the way home my partner asked what would have happened had his foul not been a double foul, but instead had only been against the defensive player.
I wasn't sure how to administer it. Since both fouls happened simultaneously we can't ignore either one. I surmised that it would constitute a False Multiple Foul because although only one team fouled the fouls were not committed against the same opponent. Thus both fouls would carry their full penalty. In this case (team fouls 7&8) that would mean awarding the 1-and-1 to each fouled player. What I don't know is which player should attempt his FTs first with the lane cleared and which should shoot with players in the spaces? My partner wondered if each player didn't receive one FT similar to the penalty for a true multiple foul. Perhaps, but that doesn't seem right to me, since this doesn't fully meet the definition of a multiple foul and the case book has a play for a FMF that instructs the officials to award the full penalty for each foul.
Followup question: What if these were team fouls 6&7? Now which player shoots the bonus and which doesn't?
I really don't know and felt that the actual situation was bizarre enough as it was.
Anyone have any ideas?