Quote:
Originally posted by Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.
Lets look at your two plays separately. In both plays NFHS R7-S5-A7 allows for as few as one player and as many as five players from Team A to be on the out-of-bounds side of the end line at the same time during the throw-in. R7-S5-A7 also allows the players from Team A to pass the ball among themselves, but Team A is still subject R7-S6-A1. Behind the end line means just that. The end line ends where intersects with the sideline and the sideline ends where it intersects with the end line. For the sake of this argument lets confine Team A to only two players on the out-of-bounds side of the end line during the throw-in.
Play #1: A1 passes the ball to A2: a) The ball goes past A2, who never touches the ball, and the ball continues along the out-of-bounds side of the end line and goes past the intersection point of the sideline and the end line. Or b) A2 fumbles the pass, and the ball continues out-of-bounds and goes past the plane of the sideline. In both (a) and (b) Team A did not meet the requirements of R7-S6-A1 that require the ball to be passed directly onto the court such that it shall touch another player (inbounds or out of bounds) on the court before going out of bounds untouched. Therefore Team A has committed a throw-in violation.
Play #2: A1 passes the ball to A2: a) The ball goes past A2, who never touches the ball, and the ball strikes the wall behind the end line. Or b) A2 fumbles the pass, and the ball strikes the ball behind the end line. In both (a) and (b) Team A did not meet the requirements of R7-S6-A1 that require the ball to be passed directly onto the court such that it shall touch another player (inbounds or out of bounds) on the court before going out of bounds untouched. Therefore Team A has committed a throw-in violation.
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MTD,
I am not challenging your logic, I am disputing your application of 7-6-1 to this situation. To quote from that rule, "The
throw-in pass shall touch another player (inbounds or out of bounds) on the court before going out of bounds untouched. The
throw-in pass shall not touch a teammate while it is on the out-of-bounds side of the throw-in boundary plane."
Now add "Any player of the team may make a direct throw-in or he/she may pass the ball along the end line to a teammate(s) outside the boundary line." from 7-5-7.
My stance is that in both plays you discuss above, Team A is not making a throw-in pass. They are making a pass amongst teammates on the out-of-bounds side of the throw-in boundary. Since this pass was never intended to go into the court, it doesn't qualify as a throw-in pass, and thus is not subject to the provisions of such a pass.
As conclusive proof that this is not a throw-in pass: (1) realize that when teammates pass the ball OOB along the endline the throw-in count does not stop. However, "the throw-in count ends when the ball is released by the thrower so the passed ball goes directly into the court." 4-41-4 and (2) the second sentence that I quoted above from 7-6-1 says that a teammate may not touch a throw-in pass while it is on the OOB side of the throw-in plane, but this is just what is done and is permitted with this pass. Both of these show that this pass cannot qualify as a throw-in pass.
So to sum up, this pass is not a throw-in pass and thus it does not have to go directly into the court and Team A cannot be penalized if it doesn't. Team A has until the full five seconds expires to execute a throw-in pass.