No, they didn't. They based their action and shot on what showed on the clock...they thought they had time to make another pass and did. The clock completely screwed them.

Probably. Probably not.

NCAA officials have this easy. They can use the monitor and a stopwatch to determine whether or not the foul counts and how much time should remain in the game.

NFHS officials can't go that route. Let's discuss what you should do if this happens in your high school game. To me that's more interesting.

I don't think they have it so easy on this play. There was no going back to make it right. It isn't like the clock ran extra after a whistle where they can use the monitor to get it fixed. When the clock stops that early and isn't noticed until after the shot, there is no easy to it. The result isn't "right" no matter what they can do.

You're making a HUGE assumption there with little proven factual basis. Assuming he had the ability to know where the clock was, didn't he know it was at 8, 7, and 6 seconds before it froze at 5.6? He stops his dribble at about 6.5 left with the clock still running, and passes. Neither he nor the player he passes to can know the clock will stop, so if they are truly in the know about the time, they know they have a little more than 5 seconds at that point. What does the player that gets the pass do? He immediately passes it back to a player and sees 2 defenders within about 4 feet of the player with the ball now. The player with the ball is now about 5-6 feet behind the 3 point line. You have to be able to show how his actions with about 3 seconds would differ than those with the 5.6 he allegedly saw up when he got the pass back.

They need to look toward using a backup clock -- one that is at the table and can be fed into the video for replay.

The clock freezing is a bit of a pain. I had a football playoff game the year before last where we had to reset the game clock like 6 times in the last 3 minutes of the game. It just kept stopping through no fault of the clock operators.

I know we often have our own personal counts when possessions begin with just a handful of seconds left, to combat against the clock not starting properly. This is usually coming out of a timeout, but otherwise on an inbounds play.

I forget when this possession began, but I feel like it was with more than 10 seconds remaining. Does anyone ever do a personal count of this length? Even so, once you determine the clock has started properly, do you usually just bag your count? I know I do.

Might not anymore though ...

I count to myself always when the clock is under 30 seconds. I adjust my "internal clock" whenever I can see the game clock.