What would you do?

[Buckley]

Here is a somewhat strange case that happened to our crew on Saturday during a small college game. What would you do?

Team A scores a basket. The ball becomes loose and caroms to a fan in the front row of the bleachers directly under the basket. The fan holds the ball and kind of "shows off" to his buddies--nothing malicious, but did delay the game for a 3-5 seconds. Our lead official blew the play dead. However, there was a team A sub at the table when this happened, so when the play was whistled dead, I, as new lead, went to my partner to discuss whether or not to let the sub in. We decided to let the sub in since a team A player was not at fault, just a team A fan.

Of course the team B coach was furious that we let the sub in, but I explained that we would do the same for him under the same circumstances and that we warned the fans under the hoop to stay away from the basketball--remember, the ball caromed(spelling??) to the fan, he did not run after the ball.

What do you guys(gals) think about our letting the sub in? What might you do?