Flashing Lights ...

[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

The 1996-97 NFHS Casebook contains caseplay 3.5.B (page 27) that interprets shoes with flashing lights as being illegal.

I'm writing a magazine article about rule changes and I'm trying to figure out when this interpretation was first made. I don't have any books older than 1996-97 (I wish I had kept my older books). It had to be sometime between 1992-93 and 1995-96.

If any grizzled veterans have a little extra time on their hands, can you please take a quick look though your old NFHS Casebooks (Section 3.5 in 1992-93, 1993-94, 1994-95, and 1995-96) and find out for me when this interpretation was first made?

It would be greatly appreciated.

I hate to ask Mark T. DeNucci, Sr. to take that long climb up to his to cold, dark, attic library. I'm sure that he's still mad at me for that sundial remark, although, if I do say so, it was pretty funny.

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Here's what I've got so far. I would love to put a date on the NFHS ban.

Karl Malone (Louisiana Tech 1982-1985, NBA 1985-2004), and Hakeem Olajuwon (Houston 1981-1984, NBA 1984-2002), both endorsed LA Gear basketball shoes. In 1993, they both wore LA Gear shoes with flashing lights in NBA games, and the NBA, and later the NFHS, banned shoes with flashing lights.

I am not going to climb up into my attic and it is not that I do not want to climb up into it, but Billy knows why and since he lives in a State that is populated with many people who have lots of vowels in their last names he knows how to keep his mouth shut unless he wants to sleep with the fishes, .

I am positive that the rule was added in either the 1993-94 or 1994-95 season. If I were a betting man I would bet on the 1994-95 season, but I have this nagging feeling that it might be the 1993-94 season. I feel like I am boxing a quinella at the jai-lai arena.


1a) The NFHS Casebook is divided into two Parts: Part 1 and Part 2.

1b) For all intents and purposes Part 2 is the Casebook for a given season.

1c) All new CB Plays added to the Casebook for a given year are listed in Part 1.

1d) All new CB Plays listed in Part 1 are also listed in Part 2 but are shaded GRAY.

2) I would bet dollars to donuts that the CB Play in question in Part 2 of the 1996-97 Casebook was not shaded GRAY because, knowing you Billy, you have already done your due diligence and also checked Part 1 of the 1996-97 Casebook.

3) Mark, Jr., started playing YMCA basketball in the 1994-95 season, and I remember commenting to the father of a little girl on his team that her flashing lights shoes would illegal for H.S. basketball. That makes me want to say that the rule was adopted for the 1994-95 season.


MTD, Sr.