[Back In The Saddle]

Originally posted by Jurassic Referee

Quoting from page 41: Basket interference may occur during a field goal or free-throw attempt, or when a tapped ball is in flight from a player toward his/her basket, or whenever the ball is in, on, or directly above the basket, regardless of how it got there....

I've learned my new thing for the day, now I can go to bed [/B]

New thing,BITS? Hardly new. I agreed with that particular language point about 3 days ago. That's what the rule(NFHS R4-6-1) that I just finished quoting above, to try and help Chuck out in HIS argument, says. The key word in this whole argument from that language is one word- "in"-as in "in the basket",and the argument that we're having is whether "in" should include balls going "up" as well as the normal calls with the balls coming down to the basket. I'm saying that the NFHS rulesmakers never contemplated putting in a rule that would allow us to award points on a play like this where it would otherwise always be impossible for those points to be scored. As I stated before,the NCAA recognizes that fact in their rules,and nowhere is it recognized in the published rules differences that the NFHS differs.

[Edited by Jurassic Referee on Aug 2nd, 2003 at 01:38 AM] [/B][/QUOTE]Previously I would have agreed with you entirely.

However, the comment in the handbook states that it's basket interference regardless of how the ball came to be in the basket (i.e., doesn't matter if it got in the basket from the top or the bottom). It may not be what the rulesmakers envisioned, but it's what they published to the world.