[bisonpitcher]

I am just getting into basketball officiating after a long stint in baseball. When you guys report to the table, do you use the same hand (either right or left for numbers) all the time, or do you switch based on where in the reporting area you are reporting from?

BTW, had first game last week. 8th Grade G/B. Both games went pretty smooth. Had one call I think I blew in retrospect. Player catches outlet pass and is turning up the floor and dribbles extremely hard. The player misses the dribble on it's way up and it goes at least 6 feet over his head. He takes about 3 steps running under it and catches the dribble at a stop. It just looked so wrong that I blew the whistle instincively and signaled a traveling violation. After I made the call (nobody complained), I thought more about this play and think I missed on this one. Can anyone enlighten me on this? Would this be covered by the wording that I read which stated in essence, cannot travel during a dribble?

I did actually bail my partner out on one call in the boys game (He had been calling basketball for a few years but seemed to have more questions about rules/mechanics than I did, which I have to admit was not confidence inspiring). I was administering a two shot foul early in the 3rd quarter. I had just bounced the ball to white 32 to shoot the first of two shots. As he released the ball, one of white's players ran out on the floor right in front of my partner. He calls the T for unbeckoned substitute. He then wanted to go shoot the Technical foul shots at the other end. I met him and informed him that we still needed to administer the second foul shot for white, then let black shoot their 2 on the other end and give black the ball at the division line. A couple trips up the floor later, I noticed that white had 0 team fouls on the scoreboard. On the next dead ball I informed the table that we should have a team foul for the technical on white. The scorer said that my partner told them it was not a team foul in that situation. My partner's reply was that he thought personals were the only fouls that counted as team fouls. I said that it should count toward team and personal for that player since it was direct. We got it fixed at the table after that.

Felt good when the losing coach of the boy's game came up to me after the game and told me I did a great job and complemented me on my hustle (he was unaware that I was new, which I guess is as good a complement as I could get).