Perhaps some of you saw the NC St./Duke game or have seen some highlights on ESPN, but I had a question about an odd play.
In the second half NC State's Julius Hodge was being guarded by Ewing. He suddenly extended his arms fully and swung the ball in an upward arc forward and clipped the chin of his defender WITH THE BALL. No person-to-person contact was made.
The covering official called a player control foul. I'm glad that he made some kind of call on the play. It probably stopped an ugly incident. He also did a great job of turning around and getting in between the players after he quickly reported.
My issue here is that I didn't think that a player could commit a personal foul by contacting his opponent with only the ball. I thought that this play had to be and definitely warranted a technical foul. I'm not sure of exactly what type since the NCAA has so many different ones. I'll have to look in the online rulesbook.

What did you guys think of this play?

I had a play recently where a player pushed off the defender with the ball. I called it a PC foul. It never occured to me that it was not possible.

I don't know the NCAA rule but when I saw the play and the PC foul called, I was thinking that the ball might be considered an extension of the hand. I was thinking this because in NF, the hand is considered part of ball per the rules. Does this make sense? Glad Duke won. Think they play NC this weekend.

I'm watching the game now. The play you are talking about just happened, isn't that ironic. What was Hodge thinkin?
The official did a great job getting between them, and he is now bringing them together following a time out, good job. The announcers are saying he is lucky a T wasn't called on him.

IMO a PC foul was the right call there.

I agree, PC was probably the right call, the official got the desired result all without escalating the situation. I didn't see the actual play, but it doesn't sound too violent.

I watched the game. It was clearly an intentional foul.
I though the ref cut him some slack because he was the team's big gun. If I saw that at the high school level I would have called it fighting and ran him out of the game.

ALthough I didn't see the play, I would have to ask what happened to get Hodge to that point? Was there a lot of physical play? Did he think he got fouled on a play when there wasn't a call? I personally TRY to catch this stuff before it gets to this point...but that isn't always possible. Sounds like the official did a nice job of taking care of it.

I saw the play, and watched the game from beginning to end, and there was nothing I saw (on TV) that would have caused Hodge to do that. Of course, on TV you don't see that match-up all game long and you can't hear what is being said, but from the TV observers perspective it was out of the blue. The Duke player was playing good defense but was not right up on him, he had backed up about 2- 3 feet when Hodge took a deliberate swipe at him. I think it came out of frustration in that NC State had lost 3 in a row, he is in a terrible slump and had been shut down in that game by Duke's D.

All of that being said, I think the official got what he needed to and did an excellent job of separating the players afterward. The Duke player got up in Hodges face and did a little woofing about it. Could have been a "T" here on Duke, but I think that would have poured fuel on the fire and things would have really gotten out of control. All in all, great job by the official in my opinion.

I may have separated the players BEFORE I turned to report that one!

Really?

So if a player is holding the ball with his palm facing up, and touches the back of his hand to the playing court, is that dribbling?

And......if a defender whacks the hand on the ball <b>deliberately</b> and not <b>incidentally</b>, is that a foul or not?

It seems to me that we've discussed plays where there was no body contact at all, but a foul-type move was performed by the ball-handler. If I remember correctly, we decided that this wasn't a foul in Fed, and that it couldn't be called. Am I mis-remembering?

I'm not saying this wasn't a good call. It sounds like it did the job. I'd certainly consider a PC call, even against the rule, in a situation like this. But the question remains in my mind, what is the rule? Fed different from NCAA?

Lessee....

- A PC fouls is a common foul committed by a player in control of the ball.

- A common foul is a personal foul that is neither flagrant or intentional...(among other things)

- A personal foul is a foul committed by a player that involves illegal contact with an opponent while the ball is live. (Note it does not define the contact other than to say it is illegal contact ie doesn't have to be body to body.)

- A technical foul neither involves contact with an opponent nor causes contact with an opponent while the ball is dead.

So unless the foul was judged intentonal or flagrant a PC is the only possibility.

This is a great point. Why didn't it get brought up last time?

I thought you said you were not a mind reader?:D