I stayed to watch the boys varsity tonight. Big rivaly game, stands are packed, the band is rocking, it's so loud that sometimes you can't hear the whistles or even the horn. The game is a barn burner from beginning to end. My team (the guys in stripes) are more than equal to the task. They are, in fact, putting on a mechanics clinic (in the best sense of that phrase) and I shoulda been scribbling notes feverishly.

With about 8 seconds to go, the visitors are trailing by two, but their worst free throw shooter ties it up with two huge free throws. It's pandimonium in the visitor's section!

Home team pushes it up the floor, point guard launches a running jumper from behind the arc that lands and sits on the flange FOREVER before finally dropping into the basket. The horn goes off, and the entire home team student section rushes onto the floor.

The trail is waiting to leave the floor but his partner is engulfed in the sea of students. I'm starting to get a little worried about him, frankly. This goes on for nearly a minute. Finally the PA announcer comes on and tells the students to clear the floor because there is time remaining on the game clock.

As soon as the basket went, the lead had glanced at the visiting bench, seen the head coach's time-out request, then had the presence of mind to look at the clock. So after clearing a few hundred jubilant students from the floor, they put 0.8 seconds back on the clock and the visitors get one last chance to tie it up again. They throw up a desperation shot that misses the mark.

The home crowd goes nuts and the band is rocking louder than ever!

Is there a better way to spend a Friday night? :D

Hmmmm.....Should the home team be charged with a T for their crowd prematurely storming the court? :D

Why was less than a second put on the clock?

Maybe the time out was granted at 1.8 seconds?
1.8 seconds less the 1 second for lag time would be .8 seconds? Just a guess.

Yes, but the post says, "they put 0.8 seconds back on the clock." You can't "put 0.8 seconds back on the clock."

If the clock had .8 seconds on it when the TO was requested, then lag time kicks in and the game is over.

If the clock had 1.8, as you speculated, and ticked down to 0:00, then by rule, 1.8 would have to be put back on the clock.

Bottom line, if the clock ticked down to 0:00, then there's no way that I can think of that you can put less than 1.1 seconds back on the clock, which is why Chuck asked the question.

Unless they didn't know the rules well, and did it wrong.

If the official saw the request, blew the whistle, THEN LOOKED AT THE CLOCK and time kept running, the correct thing to do BY RULE is put back the time that the official saw and it does not need to be more than 1 second.

None of that info is in the original post.

And BITS, there is a better way to spend a Friday night. Working that game.;)

[Edited by blindzebra on Jan 21st, 2006 at 03:06 PM]

I'm going with 5.10.1D on this play, which means all the time would have to be put back on the clock. Since .8 would be less than 1 second, based on 5.10.1D, it would not be possible to put .8 back up.

Unless they didn't know the rules well, and did it wrong. [/B][/QUOTE]

__________________________________________________ _______
Blaspemy! Only coaches don't know the rules, remember?

5.10.1

COMMENT: Timing mistakes which may be corrected are limited to those which result from the timer's neglect to stop or start the clock as specified by the rules. The rules do not permit the referee to correct situations resulting in normal reaction time of the timer which results in a “lag” in stopping the clock. By interpretation, “lag or reaction” time is limited to one second when the official's signal is heard and/or seen clearly. One second or the “reaction” time is interpreted to have elapsed from the time the signal was made until the official glanced at the clock. The additional three seconds which subsequently ran off the clock is considered a timing mistake.

What we do know was that the official saw the request and THEN looked at the clock.

We don't know if the official blew his whistle or not, but if the sequence was TO, whistle, look at clock by rule lag time is interpreted as the time it took the official to look at the clock, so it does not need to be a second.

The one second of lag time is only locked in as one second if the official was looking at the clock at the time the whistle blows, which is what situation D says. That did not happen in this case as written.

Once again time for one of my crusades:

When tenths of a second show on a game clock, the official should be allowed to put back the exact amount of time that s/he saw, regardless of when s/he first looked at the clock.

I just got an email from one of the Rules Committee members. (I met him at an IAABO meeting.) He was asking for rule change suggestions. I'm going to send him an email recommending that the FED adopt the ruling that came down from the NCAA this year on this very subject.

And are you going to suggest getting rid of 3-4-9 and 3-4-10?!

Actually, yes. But I wouldn't know. I have no life.

Yes, but how do we KNOW that only 1 second ticked off? I don't deny that that's a possibility but the truth is we don't know what happened.

And I don't know for sure which order it happened in. I didn't ask enough questions to get all the details. But let me throw out another consideration. The way the crowd errupted, I could barely hear the horn. What if the whistle cannot be heard? I don't suppose that changes anything? Still have to allow for lag time, and if it's see request, whistle, look at clock you can still count that as the lag time, but if it's see request, look at clock, whistle, but there is less than one second you have to account for lag time and let the clock run out?

BTW, does this have anything to do with why they stop the clock after made baskets in the NCAA? To allow for these kinds of time out requests without having to fuss with the clock?

[Edited by back in the saddle on Jan 21st, 2006 at 11:17 PM]

One day I hope it will be :)

No. The NBA and NCAA stop the clock after a made basket in the closing minute(s) of the game so that the team that's leading can't simply hold the ball OOB and let the last 4.9 seconds of the game elapse. They want to force the team to play that last 5 seconds.

Then why doesn't that rule only apply to the last 5 seconds instead of the whole last minute, Mr. Logic Person?

Um, b/c you can't run out the last 5 seconds of the game while you're still in the first minue of the game? Seems like pretty simple logic to me. :shrug:

We don't need to KNOW that 1 second ticked off. The comment very clearly states that the time it takes the official to look up at the clock is interpreted to be enough 'reaction' time. If the official looked up and saw the clock after seeing the timeout signal and saw 0.8, he/she should put 0.8 on the clock.

And you also can't run out the clock if you're in the first 55 seconds of the <b>last</b> minute of the game either.....

Which was my point. Now, Mr. Logic/WeaselBoy, again.....why should the rule apply to <b>ANY</b> other time during the game, rather than very specifically during the last 5 seconds of the game, if time isn't gonna run out during any other time?

Because if you want to use such a rule, you've got to pick some time at which the provision kicks in. Since it would probably be tough to administer only in the last 5 seconds, and would make the game too long if you used it through the entire game, you have to pick some other arbitrary time. The rulesmakers picked 1 minute.

Why should the mercy rule kick in at 30 points instead of 32? Same thing. Have to pick some arbitrary number and that one doesn't seem unreasonable. :double shrug:

Yabut, <b>you</b> said that the rule was <b>only</b> implemented to cover the last 5 seconds of a quarter. You said that. I heard ya. If so, then <b>why</b> would the rulesmakers have have to cover <b>any</b> other period of play other than that? They coulda said "This rule only applies to the last 5 seconds of each quarter".

I'm not giving up until it's time to pop a brownpop and watch the start of the first quarter.

Anybody but Seattle.....we'll never hear the end of it from Rocky....the little sh!t will be insufferable(much like you and the other Pats' fans were over the last few years).....

No, I didn't. I said "the last 5 seconds of the game". So there. Nyahhhh. I win. Go Seahawks.

Go Seahawks. [/B][/QUOTE]I kew it it, I knew it.....

It's some kinda national conspiracy funded by the NAATP(National Association for the Advancement of Tiny People....

It's true, it's true......

I'm only rooting for 'em to make you miserable :D

Not true. If it were true, we would simply ALWAYS reset the clock to what the official saw when he looked at it. Two separate case plays wouldn't be necessary. For all we know, he didn't look at the clock until the horn sounded.

[Edited by BktBallRef on Jan 22nd, 2006 at 03:45 PM]

What is being lost here is just how often are we looking at the clock as we or are partner blows the whistle?

I think most of us will routinely glance at the clock after every whistle, but really how often are we looking directly at the clock during the whistle?

I'd say it would be extremely rare for an official to ever have definite knowledge of exactly 1 second of lag time running off, so in most cases we will be dealing with the sequence of whistle, then look and interpreted lag time with the time being put back up.

I'd like to see the rules reflect the reality of the situation, instead of adding the confusion of 1 second of lag time is allowed, because too many officials may think that means a second always needs to come off the clock.

Well, I see this argument rears its ugly head again. Count me in the camp supporting putting .8 back on the clock. Also, count me in the camp wanting a specific rule and case example in the new NFHS rules to clear this up once and for all.