During our recent basketball clinic we fell into the discussion about loss of contacts.
Situation: Player A1 lost a contact during the game. Team A is losing, there is only 1:30 left on the clock. Team A has one timeout remaining. After the player announces the lost contact to the official, the official suspends play. The official checks the book to see if the player was identfied, as a contact wearer; he was not.
Issue: Does the Officail take the last timeout?

Huh?

'Check the book to see if the player is identified as a player who wears contacts.'
I don't beleive that I have ever read the in the rule books anywhere. What is this all about?

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Ron
Seattle Officials - Women's Basketball

Stop play. Look for the contact lens. It is an official time out. There is no rule charging a team a time-out for loss of contacts. It is common courtesy to both teams and to the player involved to stop the game long enough to find the lens. I always ask in pregame if anyone is wearing contacts so we will know to stop play if someone loses one. This is obvious, but make sure there is no play on goal when you stop play.

Gary

In my experience as a timer/scorer, I've always been told that unless the fact that a player wears contacts is recorded in the book, it is a charged time-out if they lose a contact.

The key, just the palyer who lost them looks for them. Everyone else clears the area away form the benches to avoid the "Phantom" time out. This way the coaches can not t alk to the players. The moment the conversatuion starts from coacjhes to the other four is the time to tell the caoch he is being charged with a time out. There are no rules in the book regarding announcemnments to the scorer regarding contacts. There is a mention that thereferee's will call an officials tome out to have the player look for them.

Guys, this is covered in the NCAA men's rules under 5-11 (exceptions) and there is no time out charged. If Fed. rules don't cover this, then that should be suggested to the powers that be. Just ask the player who their optometrist is. If they gag on the reply, you could be right in assuming that they don't wear contacts!

PS Don't let this out to those smart coaches because they may actually use it to their advantage.