Quote:
Originally Posted by HokiePaul
I've searched through my old emails and I can't find the email that I'm remembering... so I must back-track a bit from my assertion that my association stated this directly (maybe it was verbally at a meeting instead of an email or from one of my non-association assignors).
But the instruction that I recall was simply to not tell players to go get the ball (looks lazy and it is not their job). 99% of the time, the ball makes it's way back to the official in a reasonable amount of time. In a case where the ball ends up at the other end of the court and no player is nearby to pick it up, the game is now being held up. It would be inappropriate for the officials to direct one of the players to go chase after it. In that case, the nearest official should jog over and get it.
But I did not mean to suggest that every time the ball goes out of bounds, there should be an official running right after it and turning his back to the players.
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For what it's worth, I did find the email I was thinking of and it was from our Scholastic commissioner/assigner to all officials based on his observations from the first couple weeks of the season:
"There is no NFHS rule or Association policy that states players are supposed to retrieve a loose ball. It is the responsibility of a member of the crew to retrieve the ball while the other member/s of crew observe the players. Forcing players to retrieve the ball gives the appearance we are lazy or out of shape."