2023-24 NFHS Basketball Rules Questionnaire

[BillyMac]

2023-24 NFHS Basketball Rules Questionnaire

Part I – Are these changes made last year satisfactory?

1. Allowing hair-control devices and adornments provided they are securely fastened close to the head and do not increase risk to the athlete, teammates and opponents.

Part II – Observations – Have you seen in your area?

1. Players wearing tights with different leg lengths.

2. Excessive delays by one player due to eyeglasses falling to the floor and requiring the referee to stop play.

3. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by fans toward officials.

4. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by coaches toward officials.

5. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by players toward officials.

6. A positive transition to the 35-second shot clock.

Part III – About rules for 2023-24 – Would you favor?

1. Awarding two free throws after the fifth team foul and resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

2. Awarding a bonus free throw for the fifth, sixth and seventh team foul each quarter if the first free throw is successful and two free throws beginning with the eighth team foul of each quarter. Resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

3. Eliminating the penalty for dunking during pre-game and halftime warm-ups.

4. Assessing a penalty to coaches for illegal player equipment.

5. Eliminating the jump ball that begins the game and each extra period and begin play with a coin flip to determine team possession.

6. Eliminating the jump ball that begins each extra period and determining possession to start play with the alternating-possession arrow.

7. Increasing from five to six fouls (personal or technical) before disqualification.

8. Adding an exception to allow a replaced player to re-enter the game at the next opportunity to substitute when the opposing team has committed a foul or a violation before the game clock has properly started.

9. Establishing goaltending when the ball contacts the backboard and any part of the ball is above the rim during a field-goal attempt when the ball is touched by a player as long as it has a possibility of entering the basket.

10. Allowing all shirts worn by teammates under the away jersey to be black or a single solid color similar to the torso of the jersey while still requiring all teammates to match.

11. Limiting the head coach to only request a time-out during a dead-ball situation.

12. Removing coaching box privileges from the head coach only when the head coach receives a direct technical foul and allowing the head coach the use of the coaching box after an indirect technical foul.

13. Establishing four designated throw-in spots (one along each sideline at the 28-foot mark and one 3 feet outside of each lane line along the end line) when there is team control in the offense’s frontcourt and the defense commits a violation or a single personal foul in the offense’s frontcourt.

[crosscountry55]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

2023-24 NFHS Basketball Rules Questionnaire

Part I – Are these changes made last year satisfactory?

1. Allowing hair-control devices and adornments provided they are securely fastened close to the head and do not increase risk to the athlete, teammates and opponents.

Part II – Observations – Have you seen in your area?

1. Players wearing tights with different leg lengths.

2. Excessive delays by one player due to eyeglasses falling to the floor and requiring the referee to stop play.

3. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by fans toward officials.

4. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by coaches toward officials.

5. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by players toward officials.

6. A positive transition to the 35-second shot clock.

Part III – About rules for 2023-24 – Would you favor?

1. Awarding two free throws after the fifth team foul and resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

2. Awarding a bonus free throw for the fifth, sixth and seventh team foul each quarter if the first free throw is successful and two free throws beginning with the eighth team foul of each quarter. Resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

3. Eliminating the penalty for dunking during pre-game and halftime warm-ups.

4. Assessing a penalty to coaches for illegal player equipment.

5. Eliminating the jump ball that begins the game and each extra period and begin play with a coin flip to determine team possession.

6. Eliminating the jump ball that begins each extra period and determining possession to start play with the alternating-possession arrow.

7. Increasing from five to six fouls (personal or technical) before disqualification.

8. Adding an exception to allow a replaced player to re-enter the game at the next opportunity to substitute when the opposing team has committed a foul or a violation before the game clock has properly started.

9. Establishing goaltending when the ball contacts the backboard and any part of the ball is above the rim during a field-goal attempt when the ball is touched by a player as long as it has a possibility of entering the basket.

10. Allowing all shirts worn by teammates under the away jersey to be black or a single solid color similar to the torso of the jersey while still requiring all teammates to match.

11. Limiting the head coach to only request a time-out during a dead-ball situation.

12. Removing coaching box privileges from the head coach only when the head coach receives a direct technical foul and allowing the head coach the use of the coaching box after an indirect technical foul.

13. Establishing four designated throw-in spots (one along each sideline at the 28-foot mark and one 3 feet outside of each lane line along the end line) when there is team control in the offense’s frontcourt and the defense commits a violation or a single personal foul in the offense’s frontcourt.

I could get behind “would you favor” #3, 9, 10, 11, and 13.

I don’t want #12 because I’d rather see the seat belt rule disappear altogether. It’s all or nothing for me, preferably nothing.

Not on the list but something I desperately want to see to help re-balance high school offenses: extending the arc to 20’9”.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bas2456]

I will say to anyone from the Federation who will listen...

Give us a flop warning. Don't think we need to go straight to a technical foul, since NFHS doesn't have Class A/B like college does, but it was as bad as I've ever seen this season.

And yes, I know it's in the rulebook that we can penalize "faking being fouled". This is just me talking, but I have never called it, nor have I had a partner call it. That said, as above, it was particularly bad this year and I probably should have called it at least once.

[bas2456]

Originally Posted by crosscountry55

I could get behind “would you favor” #3, 9, 10, 11, and 13.

I don’t want #12 because I’d rather see the seat belt rule disappear altogether. It’s all or nothing for me, preferably nothing.

Not on the list but something I desperately want to see to help re-balance high school offenses: extending the arc to 20’9”.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I do think the Federation should get more with the college rulebook. I don't think the loss of the coach's box is much of a deterrent. I'm fine with coaches requesting a timeout during a live ball, but also would favor 1, 3, 10, 13

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by bas2456

I will say to anyone from the Federation who will listen...

Give us a flop warning. Don't think we need to go straight to a technical foul, since NFHS doesn't have Class A/B like college does, but it was as bad as I've ever seen this season.

And yes, I know it's in the rulebook that we can penalize "faking being fouled". This is just me talking, but I have never called it, nor have I had a partner call it. That said, as above, it was particularly bad this year and I probably should have called it at least once.

Just so we are aware, the NCAA does not have a flop warning anymore. They have a flop T. I am good with both, but we need more defined actions that should be adjudicated more than what we have know. People act like the NCAA just put in some wording about flopping and left it that. They clearly gave examples and procedures on how to follow that rule. The NF is just lazy when it comes to specifics when it is trends in the game. This is a trend that should be addressed somehow.

Peace

[bob jenkins]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

Just so we are aware, the NCAA does not have a flop warning anymore. They have a flop T. I am good with both, but we need more defined actions that should be adjudicated more than what we have know. People act like the NCAA just put in some wording about flopping and left it that. They clearly gave examples and procedures on how to follow that rule. The NF is just lazy when it comes to specifics when it is trends in the game. This is a trend that should be addressed somehow.

Peace

NCAAW has neither (yet).

Resetting the fouls at the end of each quarter is the best rule change NCAAW has made recently. I would support that for FED

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by bob jenkins

Resetting the fouls at the end of each quarter is the best rule change NCAAW has made recently. I would support that for FED

I worry that the chance of correctable errors (failure to award a merited free throw) due to poor communication between the table and the officials would double.

NCAA probably has better personnel at the table than most high schools, and certainly has much better personnel at the table than every middle school, middle schools that often use student scorekeepers, and that often don't have scoreboards that show team fouls.

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

5. Eliminating the jump ball that begins the game and each extra period and begin play with a coin flip to determine team possession.

How do you like them apples Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.?

Worked a game last week, I was the referee and the tosser. Jumper tapped the ball that subsequently hit the floor and then the jumper caught the ball with two hands. My partner, a seasoned veteran, called a violation. I trotted over to him and asked, did you see the ball hit the floor. He replied in the positive, and I convinced him to change his call to an inadvertent whistle. At least he was looking, many of my partners seem to be brain dead until the jump ball ends, and then wake up and come alive, hoping that everything was by the book and happy to get it over with.

[BillyMac]

The jump ball is as outdated as two-hand set shots, laced basketballs, peach baskets, and chicken wire cages around the perimeter of the court. For generations of players and fans they are a forgettable anachronistic formality. Coaches bemoan inconsistency in officials tossing the ball, and unevenly governed rules about the movement of players during the jump ball, and some officials are weary of policing these microbursts of mayhem.

Once a game, the tallest players on each team square off against each other, the referee tries to make a decent toss, and the umpire just hopes that nothing "weird" happens because many of us, including me, don't know the jump balls rules as well as we knew them years ago.

Now that we only have about one jump ball per game, many officials, players, and coaches don't know the rules as well as we knew them back in ancient times. Back in ancient times every official knew all the permutations of the jump ball rules, before the toss, after the toss, after the tip, jumpers, nonjumpers on the circle, non-jumpers off the circle, backwards, forwards, inside out, and upside down. Officials had to know these jump ball restrictions because in some games you could have dozens of jump balls, in three different jump ball circles: the jump ball to start the game, each period, overtime periods, and all situations where we now use the alternating possession arrow to adjudicate. Officials, players, and coaches all knew the jump ball rules, some coaches even had different jump ball plays for each of the three jump ball circles depending on whether one expected to win or lose the jump ball.

How well do otherwise very good officials know, understand, and adjudicate the jump ball rules today, only memorizing and adjudicating the most egregious violations (ball touched on the way up, ball touched three times by jumper, ball caught by jumper, ball hitting the floor without being touched by at least one of the jumpers)?

How can the non-tossing official in a two person game accurately and realistically observe all eight nonjumpers and the two jumpers for violations, especially when jump ball rules are so complex (and we only see a jump ball about once a game), especially the seldom called violations, when such violations happen in a split second.

Can one recite all the jump ball rules without peeking at the rulebook? Based on original positions of players, jumpers, nonjumpers, on the circle, off the circle, who can move, limits of movement, crossing lines, before the toss, during the toss, after the toss, after the tip, add to that the limitations of the jumpers; and process, interpret, and enforce, all these rules within the fraction of a second that it takes for a jump ball? Be honest. If so, one is a better basketball official than I am (with apologies to Rudyard Kipling).

To my point of otherwise extremely competent officials not fully understanding and memorizing all the many jump ball rules and restrictions, several times a year I hear otherwise extremely competent varsity officials saying, prejump, "Hold your spots" to all eight nonjumpers, or, "You can't stand behind him”, to a player who is directly behind an opponent, both whom are ten feet off the jump ball circle.

I know that I should know the jump ball rules better, but I figure why bother for a play that only happens usually once per game; lasts only a split second; with rules that basically might as well be in "Greek" to players, coaches, and fans; and that usually goes "smoothly" 95% of the time.

The jump ball is archaic, some jump ball rules are poorly understood and/or poorly enforced, and we should start games with some other method. It's the twentieth-first century. We now have alternating possession arrows. The alternating possession arrow was invented by some genius for a good reason, so let's get rid of all jump balls, give the ball to the visitors, or flip a coin, to start the game, and use the possession arrow for the rest of the game, including overtimes.

God created alternating possession for a reason, to smite all jump balls.

Now, could somebody please help me down from this soapbox? I'm getting dizzy.

[Robert Goodman]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

...and chicken wire cages around the perimeter of the court.

Anybody here know what that was about? Safety? Or were they in play, so you wouldn't need throw-ins?

[FlasherZ]

Originally Posted by Robert Goodman

Anybody here know what that was about? Safety? Or were they in play, so you wouldn't need throw-ins?

https://vault.si.com/vault/1991/11/1...-from-the-fans

Salient points:

At the time, the cage made good sense. Front-row spectators sat even closer to the court than they do today, and Naismith's original rules said that when the ball went out of bounds, the first player who got to it could throw it back in. Obviously, it would have been disastrous to allow players to wrestle in the laps of paying customers for possession of the ball. With the cage the rule was moot—the ball never went out of bounds.
[...]
Many eastern professional teams played in cages until 1925, and a few continued using them well into the '30s. Cages were rarely used outside the Northeast and never by high school, college or AAU teams. Still, the term eager was commonly used to describe all basketball players.
[...]
The original reason for using a cage was largely forgotten by the 1920s; many professionals of the time believed its purpose was to protect players from enraged fans. They had ample reason: Pro basketball in the '20s was no place for shrinking violets. It was considered fair play to drive the man with the ball into the wire or rope, especially if he was shooting. When a home-team player was thus clobbered, it was not unusual for fans to join the resulting fray. The players entered and left the cage through doors at either end, and fans sometimes fought their way in using the same openings.

So, no... the bad behavior of fans isn't new to the game.

[BillyMac]

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

2023-24 NFHS Basketball Rules Questionnaire

Part I – Are these changes made last year satisfactory?

1. Allowing hair-control devices and adornments provided they are securely fastened close to the head and do not increase risk to the athlete, teammates and opponents.

I just want to get away from having to decide what is OK. I do understand this one, but just wish there were decisions made by people higher than us.

Part II – Observations – Have you seen in your area?

1. Players wearing tights with different leg lengths.

2. Excessive delays by one player due to eyeglasses falling to the floor and requiring the referee to stop play.

3. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by fans toward officials.

4. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by coaches toward officials.

5. An increase in unsporting or confrontational behavior by players toward officials.

6. A positive transition to the 35-second shot clock.

It is getting worse from the standpoint is that we have people that feel that their behavior is OK or just to do many things. Not just with us, but with each other. We have participants that think they can say anything in the justification of "emotion" or "getting on the refs" and that is really the problem.

Also did not really do but one tournament with the 35 second shot clock, but not really worried about the implementation either.

Part III – About rules for 2023-24 – Would you favor?

1. Awarding two free throws after the fifth team foul and resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

I still do not feel this does anything for the game. Wow, we shoot a couple of less FTs. Whooppieeee!!!!!

2. Awarding a bonus free throw for the fifth, sixth and seventh team foul each quarter if the first free throw is successful and two free throws beginning with the eighth team foul of each quarter. Resetting the team foul count at the end of each quarter.

Again do not get this logic. Make FTs and it solves a lot of issues.

3. Eliminating the penalty for dunking during pre-game and halftime warm-ups.

Not for HS. Done already at the college level. HS kids are often doing things they cannot do. And what happens if the basket is broke? We do not have maintenance to easily replace and in many cases have to go to a completely different gym. Now with the shot clock stuff, is it possible you are going into a gym with no shot clock connected?

4. Assessing a penalty to coaches for illegal player equipment.

I like it in principle, but we would do the same thing we do for other things. Ignore and not penalize. This is a higher up issue IMO.

5. Eliminating the jump ball that begins the game and each extra period and begin play with a coin flip to determine team possession.

We do it once a game. No big deal.

6. Eliminating the jump ball that begins each extra period and determining possession to start play with the alternating-possession arrow.

If you are lucky you only do this a few times a year. Again, no big deal.

7. Increasing from five to six fouls (personal or technical) before disqualification.

If you lengthen the time in the game. But not with 32 minutes.

8. Adding an exception to allow a replaced player to re-enter the game at the next opportunity to substitute when the opposing team has committed a foul or a violation before the game clock has properly started.

No issues with this. It is the Men's rule basically.

9. Establishing goaltending when the ball contacts the backboard and any part of the ball is above the rim during a field-goal attempt when the ball is touched by a player as long as it has a possibility of entering the basket.

I think this is a very hard call at the college level. I would rather keep this the same.

10. Allowing all shirts worn by teammates under the away jersey to be black or a single solid color similar to the torso of the jersey while still requiring all teammates to match.

I would be OK with this. We often have to tell teams to change this anyway and often they are the same.

11. Limiting the head coach to only request a time-out during a dead-ball situation.

Been an advocate for this for some time now. Coaches think we are paying attention to them, when we are not.

12. Removing coaching box privileges from the head coach only when the head coach receives a direct technical foul and allowing the head coach the use of the coaching box after an indirect technical foul.

Get rid of the seat belt rule all together if you ask me. If they do not know how to behave, then get rid of them. But this adds to something we have to manage over something they can learn to behave. Coaches often know why they get Ts, I do not need them to sit down to get that message.

13. Establishing four designated throw-in spots (one along each sideline at the 28-foot mark and one 3 feet outside of each lane line along the end line) when there is team control in the offense’s frontcourt and the defense commits a violation or a single personal foul in the offense’s frontcourt.

I think that would take away some confusion. I like this at the college level.

Peace

[Nevadaref]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

How do you like them apples Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.?

Worked a game last week, I was the referee and the tosser. Jumper tapped the ball that subsequently hit the floor and then the jumper caught the ball with two hands. My partner, a seasoned veteran, called a violation. I trotted over to him and asked, did you see the ball hit the floor. He replied in the positive, and I convinced him to change his call to an inadvertent whistle. At least he was looking, many of my partners seem to be brain dead until the jump ball ends, and then wake up and come alive, hoping that everything was by the book and happy to get it over with.

I know that you use 2-man, so I’ll ask what does your mechanics manual (IAABO in CT) say about who has responsibility for the jumpers?

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by Nevadaref

I know that you use 2-man, so I’ll ask what does your mechanics manual (IAABO in CT) say about who has responsibility for the jumpers?

IAABO Two Person Mechanics

Tossing official rules on fouls or violations by jumpers.

Non-tossing official rules on fouls or violations by jumpers or nonjumpers.