New to the to this section of the board. I am usually over at the softball and baseball forums. However today I saw a play that I was wondering how it you would handle it.

This is on a 6th grade team. Playing in tournament. Score is 34 for Team A and 33 for Team B. In this league there is a rule that with less than a minute to go in the game on a dead ball throw in the clock does not start until offensive team crosses half court. No pressing is allowed.

There are 15.4 seconds left on clock. Team A inbounds the ball and goes up the court crosses the center line and throws it into the center. Pass is stolen by team B who immediately calls time out. Ref 1 calls the time out. Teams walk over to benches. Ref 1 realizes that the timekeeper had been running the clock. He ask that 4 seconds be put back on the clock. Saying that only 2 second should have gone off the clock before the change of possesion.

Teams are like OK and they start to setup. Ref 2 comes over and saids that is a correctable error and puts the time back on the clock but also gives the ball back to team A. Team B goes crazy. They lose the possesion plus the timeout according to the 2nd ref. 1st ref disagrees. 2nd ref is older so the 1st ref backs down.

What should have been the correct call. Just wondering.

cypercat

1st problem, who made it a rule that the clock shouldn't start until the ball reaches half court?

2nd problem, refs are confused because of the 1sr problem!

IMO

But by NFHS Rule 2-10-1 a-e, this is not a correctable error.

This is not a correctable error it falls under a timer's error.

The officials are allowed to adjust the time based on definate knowledge.

So in this case when Ref 1 blew the whistle and saw the clock still running all he/she is allowed to do is put the time that was on the clock when they first looked at it.

If a second or less ran off from the whistle to when the clock stopped, no correction is made because there is 1 second of lag time.

Thanks
 

Thanks for your replies.

I was thinking along the same lines - I just don't know all the basketball rules.

I think the key here was that a change of possesion clearly had been made and it wasn't until after this change of possesion that the ref recognized the error.

This possibly changed the outcome of this game...Team B ended up losing by 3 with another questionable call by ref 2.

After all this going back and forth they gave the ball back to Team A with 15.4 seconds to go. As Team A crossed the half court link team B fouled. Since this was an on the floor foul the ball was placed out of bounds. However ref 2 placed the inbound underneath Team A's basket. I thought for sure it should have been placed where the foul occured which would have been at half court. A clear advantage for Team A at the time. They scored on the inbound play and ended up winning by 3.

Team B was not happy but shook the other teams hand after the game.

I think I may be able to take a guess on why the clock doesn't start until the ball crosses half court. If you read the post, it states no pressing is allowed. I take this to mean you cannot guard in the back court. If this is the case, a team up by a point or two , who is inbounding a spot throw-in in the backcourt with less than 10 seconds to go in the game, can just run out the clock without the other team having a chance to get the ball.

In our local rec league, no back court guarding is allowed in 3rd and 4th grade games and this has happened sometimes.

I don't get why they have this rule in a 6th grade tournament, however. Even our local rec league 6th grade plays HS rules for defense.

yes
 

Yes that is why the clock does not start til they cross half court. I agree that at this age they should allow back court play for this level.

Thanks

Re: yes
 

Even if that is the reason, it still doesn't make any sense.

Even in unmodified rules, a team can run out the clock without ever having throw the ball in if the opponents score with less then 5 seconds left (practially 5-8 seconds). That's just the nature of HS rules. There will be a time at the end that the defending team just can't do anything about.

Around here, every time I've seen a no-press rule, this situation is avoided by allowing a press in the last minute of the 4th quarter and any overtime. Just remember, lower level refs are learning and working their way to improvement. Are you sure the foul wasn't off ball down by the base line?