Leaving the court while playing defense

[Camron Rust]

Prior rules...T was correct by the book.

New rules....a violation. Like the old rule, the new rule doesn't discriminate differnet unauthorized reasons. If it is unauthorized, it is a violation.

However, under the old rules, I agree that it doesn't make any sense to call a T. The point of the T was to prevent guys running out one door and popping in on the other side of the gym or otherwise going OOB to gain an advantage. In this case, the player was confused (or perhaps deceived by someone near the table). I can't see that this player did anything to tilt the balance advantage/disadvantage towards his team. In fact, it was quite the opposite, it gave the team a 5 vs 4 while he was sitting down.

While you could, in many cases, find a way to avoid a T when it didn't make sense, I don't think you can turn a simple violation into a T short of unsportmanlike conduct as it appears some of your Vets believe.