Not back court
 

This is not the same as Out Of Bounds.

A1, trapped by B2 & B3 in BC with ball just shy of division line. B2 & B3 are in the FC. A1 attempts pass. B3 jumps (from FC) and blocks pass back into A1's hands.

This is not a BC violation. Trying to pull some similarities to the OOB situation, some of you are basically arguing that it would be a BC violation because the ball achieved FC status when B3 blocked the pass and that A1 'caused' the ball to regain BC status because he is standing in the BC. Not true - read Rule 9-12-2.

This is obviously not a BC violation because Team A never had FC control. It doesn't meet the requirements of Article 2 because B3 touched the ball. So it is not the same as the blocked OOB play where the thrower "causes" the ball to go OOB by catching it while OOB.

The rules do not say anything about the ball must have BC status before Team A may touch it after Team B was last to touch in FC.

I think some of you are adding more than what the rule says.

Re: Not back court
 

True, but in this play A HAD the ball in the FC.

The rules say deflects it back to the back court, 9.9.1.C, the ball is in the FC until it contacts the floor, a player, or an official in the back court 4-4-3 and 4-4-4.

What the rules don't say is does A2's touching a ball that still has FC status meet the last to touch a ball in the FC aspect of the BC violation?

Re: Not back court
 

Your first situation (A1 trapped by B3 and B2) doesn't apply in this case because A never had possesion in the frontcourt. That definitely wouldn't be a backcourt violation. In the situation described, A had the ball in frontcourt and it was deflected towards the backcourt by B. Also, are you sure on Rule 9-12-2? In the Rule Book I'm looking at, Rule 9 (Violations and Penalties) Section 12 is Goaltending, or am I not looking in the right spot? Rule 9-9-1 states that A player shall not...

Be the first to touch a ball after it has been in team control in the frontcourt, if he/she or a teammate last touched or was touched by the ball in the frontcourt before it went in the backcourt."

However, I'm not sure that exactly applies becuse the ball never got to the backcourt until A touched it again.

I'll admit that I'm not as sure about my backcourt violation ruling as I was at first because it appears to me that the Rule Book is ambiguous about this situation; it describes how to rule if a player caused the ball to go out of bounds but not how to rule on who caused it to go to the backcourt (this can be assumed but isn't explicitly stated as far as I can tell) and it doesn't rule on this case where the a player in the backcourt touches a ball that still has frontcourt status but was last touched by the team not in control. I think the "safe" call (the one that wouldn't make either team's coach/fans blow a gasket) would be to let play continue. However, it doesn't appear to me that the Rule Book states explicitly either way.

The two situations may look different, but they are the same as far as the rules go. In both cases, team control is continued by A and FC is established (or continued) by the location of the last player to touch the ball. The rules do not differentiate whether player control was established in the FC, only team control. IOW, by rule, if one is not a BC violation (and the case book play says it's not), then the other cannot be; barring a case-book play saying differently.
If memory serves, the BC rule says nothing about "causing" the ball to go into the backcourt; but only about being the last to touch it in the FC after team control has been established.

I'll have to disagree. As I referenced in an earlier post, Rule 9-9-1 states very clearly that a player shall not

"Be the first to touch a ball after it has been in team control in the frontcourt"

Very clearly, there is a difference between team control in the frontcourt and backcourt.

Take "caused the ball to go backcourt" out of the equation. Unlike OOB violations, it does not matter who CAUSES the ball to go BC, just who touched it last.

If you go by this simple wording, then it doesn't matter who touches it last. According to this, if B tips the ball into the backcourt and it bounces, it's still a violation on A. Are you going to call it that way?

And you're still missing the key point in the rule and this discussion. A B player was the <b>last</b> player to touch the ball in the front court- as per rule 4-4-2 and rule 4-4-4. You conveniently left out the key part of 9-9-1, which refers to this rule only applying if A1 or a teammate was the last to touch it in the front court. They didn't - a B player did. That's all she wrote right there, folks. There is no rule in the book that I know of that now states that it's a violation of any kind if an A player is now the next player to touch the ball in the backcourt- which is where R4-4-1 and R4-4-4 say that the A player is when he touches it. If anyone can find a violation cited in the rule book, please post it.

[Edited by Jurassic Referee on Jan 25th, 2005 at 04:11 PM]

The MHSAA interpreter concurs with JR.
mick

I've tried to stop using the word "caused" in my recent posts because it isn't in the Rule Book. Just used to saying that in reference to OOB. I used the "simple wording" to illistrate the fact that frontcourt matters and I didn't think I had to quote the whole rule again as I had just done that a couple posts earlier. But, if you insist, of course it matters that B tipped the ball.

Rule 9-9-1: A player shall not...

"Be the first to touch a ball after it has been in team control in the frontcourt, if he/she or a teammate last touched or was touched by the ball in the frontcourt before it went in the backcourt."

My point is that the last phrase says "before it went in the backcourt" but in our situation the ball never obtained backcourt status until A touched it so it seems to me that our situation isn't explicitly covered by the rules.

the simple wording is wrong.

The rule reads:
"A player of the team in control shall not:
ART 1. Be the first to touch a ball after it has been in the frontcourt, if he/she or a teammate last touched or was touched by the ball in the frontcourt before it went to the backcourt."

You know... if you read that rule slowly, the answer appears to be pretty simple - NOT A BC VIOLATION.

My previous post was simply to show that this idea of "causing" the ball to go into the BC is spurious/wrong. It works for OOB but not for BC. And that misunderstanding is the additional information some were adding to the discussion. Being first to touch the ball in the BC does not mean that you caused the ball to enter the BC.

Since I started my last reply before JR posted his, I'll concede the point based on the fact that Rule 9-9-1 isn't listing what a player can do, only what they cannot do. Thus, I guess I was getting a little too lost in the fact that the rule didn't describe the situation and I wasn't realizing that, since the rule didn't cover it, it would then be a legal play.

The question now becomes...

Does the anonymous Assignmentmaker with his "nasty grammatical mix" agree?

What does 'caused' mean? It's not part of the rules, it's part of the language the rules are written in. I would suggest it means 'propelled', 'gave impetus to'. Poor A1, s/he just happened to be part of the backcourt at the time the ball was propelled into her/him; didn't cause the ball to get to the backcourt, but, rather, merely gave it backcourt location.

The rule is badly written. Does the NFHS Rules Committee deign totake questions?