The magic number

[Camron Rust]

When guys are working games that are guaranteed to make Sportcenter and are likely watched by hundreds of thousands to millions of people, they're going to do things that may not be apparent or necessary at lower levels. When there is going to be so much scrutiny over thier work, they'll not give the camera obvious ammunition to pick apart their work. They're also going to have table crew that do start the clocks on time almost without fail. They're also going to know if the clock started on time or not and will fix it right away. Given all that, they know that if the shot clock is different than their count (calling a violation before the clock says 25 or not having a violation when the clock is less than 25 and the ball is still in the BC), they're going to catch hell over it and don't let it happen...likely by taking a glance at the clock (which is very visible in big televised games).