[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Originally Posted by Junker

Ok, here's one for those of you that have coached and especially those of you who are coaches. Last night, we have a blow out going in our girl's game. Not completely out of hand, but the game was not in doubt at all. Late in the 3rd, the losing coach (who we haven't heard from all night) is chirping at me about a hand check. There was no displacement and the offensive player got where she wanted to go (east-west in this case) so I told him it was incidental and that's why it wasn't called. He asks for a time out to talk, I grant it. He starts to rant about the no call, I tell him to choose his words carefully. After a 10 second conversation, I walk away and he tells me, "You're wrong." and I call the T. He obviously wanted it. I just don't get what coaches think they are gaining from getting the T, especially in this case. It doesn't affect how I call the game, it certainly didn't fire up his team. All it did in my opinion was make him look unsporting and model poor behavior for his team. Can anyone enlighten me?

Junker:

A hand check is not incidental contact. It is a foul. Having said that, from the description that you gave above, I would have told the defender to keep her hands off. If she doesn't remove her hand it is a foul or if she does remove her hand, it will be the foul the next time it happens.

MTD, Sr.