[ranjo]

This situation occured during a GV Christmas tournament tonight.

To start the second half, the referee of the two person crew blew his whistle, handed the ball to A1 at the division line. The ball was inbounded to A2 who dribbled toward her own goal, attemped a shot, and was fouled in the process. The calling official then looked up at the clock and notices it is still counting down from 10 seconds remaining in the halftime break.

I will stop the action following this opps moment to comment; Yes, the officials were wrong to put the ball in play without checking that the clock had been reset and showed 8:00. Yes, the table should have recognized the error and blown the horn before the ball had been inbounded, but none of this happened.

What should happened next has been the subject of a debate in the officials locker room. One side says this is a do-over, and the second half should be re-started since the halftime period had not ended. The other side says both teams, the coaches, and the officials were ready to go and nobody was put at disadvantage by the starting of the second half even though the clock was not properly reset. The offended player should be awarded her free throws, and some amount of time should be removed from the clock beyond the 8:00 mark.

I agree with the second senerio, but haven't put in the effort to justify it with a rules backup except I've always been told "there are no do-overs in basketball"

So esteemed members of the forum - What is your take on this?