LONG FOUL CALL

[SMEngmann]

Granted, I wasn't there, and this may be harsh, but there's no way that the new trail should be that far away if there are two defenders who were able to get back on the layup in a boys varsity game. There are very many reasons why the call could've been missed or correctly called a travel, one of which may have been that the rook didn't pick up the secondary defender who may have contacted the shooter on the weak side. There are many times in transition with two defenders that the new L can easily miss contact initiated by the secondary defender, either a push or a grab, and the trail needs to pick that up (in other words, the slot call in 3 person). With the trail out of position to help, you're putting this young official on an island in a big situation, NO WAY can you make a call on subtle contact from that far away, but I think this is a classic help call that the trail has to be in position to make. This is a strange situation, particularly since the player didn't release a shot, and even further put the rookie on an island. Maybe the young official, in a tight situation decided to call the obvious and call only what he sees, and since he didn't see the foul and didn't want to guess, he made the only call available, the travel.

The new trail must help on this play and pick up the secondary defender. Because you weren't there, in position, you put the rookie in a position where he had to guess and basically threw him to the wolves. I agree, why was the trail 70 feet away?