Excessive Timeout
 

Boys' V. First round state tournament game.

Team A scores with 30 seconds remaining and is now trailing by 2 points. Team A has no time outs left. Team B inbounds into the corner where B1 is trapped. He throws a pass up the sideline (tableside.) A1 steps into the passing lane and makes a very athletic steal about five feet from the sideline. His momentum is carrying him out-of-bounds, however, so he jumps off of one foot, and while in midair, yells "TIME OUT" and visibly gives a time-out signal with his hands.

I am old T tableside in front of the play and grant the timeout. I was fully aware as I was granting the time out that team A had no time outs left, and that we had a technical foul.

Now, the technical foul ended up not mattering, because team B missed both free throws. Team B did end up winning the game by 5 points.

However, this has sparked a bit of a debate. The observer from the state office (who was sitting at the scorer's table literally 5 feet from this play) told me after the game that from a "game management" perspective, I should have ignored the request and simply given the ball to team B. I have also had several other officials tell me the same thing. For what it's worth, both of my partners on the floor said they would have granted the time out and charged the technical foul.

I have no problem with game management theory, and I believe that it is an important aspect of good officiating. If I can get out of a situation where a player wants an extra time out without having to grant it- I am going to do so. I don't believe this was a case where that could happen, though. The team B coach CLEARLY knew that the player was inbounds and had control of the ball when he asked for the time out. How do I explain it to him if I ignore it? The state observer's answer was "you could just tell him that his foot was on the line and he won't have a problem with it. They're getting the ball back anyway."

The ironic thing is that there were NO problems with the call. Coach A did not argue, he didn't stomp his feet, he didn't complain. The play happened right in front of him and he knew what happened. His only complaint was with the player- "What are you doing? I just told you we have no time outs left!" So from a game management standpoint, how is it going to get better if I ignore what happened? All that could happen now is that Coach B gets upset because I chose to ignore the timeout.

Sorry if I am venting a bit, but I am frustrated because I feel I did the right thing and I'm not happy that I didn't get supported by the observer. Just looking for others opinions.

I agree, especially in a late-game situation, that you may want to avoid giving an excessive TO technical......but, unless you can reaaaaly sell it to a coach, I think you need to grant the TO and give the technical. If he has 1 timeout left, are you going to not grant the timeout? No. Why do anything different because the team has 0 timeouts left. If you don't call the TO/technical, and I'm Team B's coach, we're shooting at least two more FTs for my technical too.

You went w/ your gut and followed the rules...good job. Don't second guess yourself.

I have absolutely no problem with what you did. For instance, what if they wanted to call timeout, knowing good and well that it would be a T, just to stop the clock and huddle for a minute. As I read it, that's a perfectly legitimate thing to do, and it's not your job to be second guessing why they may be calling timeout.

I think you did the right thing in this situation.

[Edited to remove complete absurdity.]

In NCAA a player who is in the air and their momentum is carrying them OB can not be granted a TO. Is NF different from NCAA in this respect?

Yes, it is.

Yes. NF did not change this rule this year. Player flying OOB/into the BC may still call TO.

In NFHS you lose possession if you call an excess time-out. In NCAA if you had team control you would retain possession.

Only NCAA-M go to POI. NCAA-W is 2+ball.

Yeah, I know. That's why I edited it. I guess maybe there aren't any great reasons to call TO in this case, but if you want it, you can have it as far as I'm concerned (as long as your willing to take the T for it)

Your state observer should re-think his position on this one. I agree strongly you handled this in the correct way, you had no other choice. To follow the state observer's advice you'd have to stretch the truth (quite a bit) about the A's player foot being on the line and lose some credibility with the B coach who knows that's not the case. If this happens to me in my State Tournament game later this month, I'm handling it just as you did.

Do you have a head state clinician or someone above this state observer you can discuss this call with? I find it very disturbing that he would tell you to ignore an obvious time out request and in fact recommend a concocted story to justify ignoring the request. I'm glad he's in your state and not mine :)

http://static.flickr.com/27/93628583_d301537c0f_m.jpg

If it's acceptable in the NCAA Final Four, then I think it's acceptable in the first round of high school playoffs.

Don't worry, I'm sure it will be like the NCAA in NFHS games before too long. Just like everything else.

Yes, I believe as long as the player has control of the ball he can. I believe is the same as the womens.

In this case, definitely a T. I'd try to ignore it only if it's blowout and his foot was mighty close to that line, close enough that I could sell it.

I agree with this. Get the call right. Don't ever compromise your integrity. You did a great job!
Game management does not equate to lying. That observer is part of the problem with sportsmanship in HS sports. He is a coward and can go straight to he11.