What is the correct procedure?

[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Here we go again....

I disagree completely. There is no rules backing for your statement above. Giving the offensive team half-court with no time taken off makes no sense at all- to me.However, there also is no rules backing for my take that it simply a do-over if there is no accurate count.

This play is not covered definitively under NFHS rules.

Maybe we can agree to disagree and cut off the usual 15-page argument about it. Anybody interested can just use the search function to find one of the many old arguments that we've had on this exact same play, if they're so inclined. We've certainly discussed this one to death.

JR:

In the immortal words of Yogi Berra: "Its deja vue all over again." But I do not believe that we can agree to disagree on this play. It does not matter whether this thread goes fifteen pages or thirty pages, Camron and I are right on this one for the same reasons that we have given before.

So lets go back to something that we can all enjoy: bashing Old School. I know that was cold wasn't it.

On a lighter note, have a nice summer.

MTD, Sr.

[Nevadaref]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dave30
I'm still confused !

If it happens again in the future. Should I :


A. Take the ball back to the original throw-in spot and not worry if the defense presses?

B. Estimate the time elapsed. Tell the clock person to run off 8 seconds and give them the ball in the frontcourt?

Dave,
I am NEVER going to do A. I cannot justify a do-over in an NFHS game. You need to make your own decision of how to handle this situation should it ever arise in one of your games. So I will give you some points that helped me make my choice.

First, the NFHS rules state that you cannot "estimate" the time elapsed. You have to have DEFINITE knowledge. In this case, that means you had a count of some kind or the official timer started counting when he noticed that the clock malfunctioned and wouldn't start. In short, if you don't KNOW, you can't change the clock in an NFHS game.
(That being said, you can confer with your partners and make an intelligent decision. Look at what the NCAA now recommends. I posted it a bit further down.)

Secondly, the NFHS has yet to come out with a clear play ruling on this, but the NCAA has. Since people have made the case that the NFHS rules are unclear and that the play should be handled in one of two ways, you need a reason to pick one method over the other. I would advise you to follow what the NCAA wrote on this. That way you at least have something in writing to point to. Note that I am not advocating that you do something contrary to NFHS rules, I am merely stating that you should enhance your decision by drawing upon this further knowledge since you may have to rely on 2-3 to make a decision. Additionally, the NFHS usually follows what the NCAA does after a few years, so you might be ahead of the game.

Here is what the NCAA published in a bulletin (2/21/07) on the women's side last season:

1/25/07 Correcting a Timer’s Mistake
Interpretation: The following interpretive ruling should replace the ruling in A.R. 120. This ruling was changed to clarify that officials must utilize all available resources and information when making a decision regarding game and/or shot clock time adjustments. Officials may not always know the exact time, as stated in the original ruling, which shall not prohibit them from adjusting the clock(s) appropriately.

Play: A.R. 120. With a few seconds remaining on the game clock in the first half, A1 makes a throw-in to A2 (game clock not started—official timer’s mistake). A2 dribbles into the front court and misses the try. B1 recovers the rebound and dribbles the full length of the playing court. As the player passes the bench, the coach of Team A notices that the game clock has not started and calls the mistake to the attention of the official timer, who starts the game clock. With one second left on the game clock in the half, A2 fouls B1. The bonus is in effect. Time expires before the official timer can stop the game clock.
Ruling: A2 shall be assessed with a personal foul. The referee cannot correct this official timer’s mistake unless he or she knows relatively how much time had elapsed while the game clock was stopped. The referee shall conduct a reenactment of the sequential occurrence of the play to determine that relative time. To assist the referee, information may be attained from the official timer or from the use of an official courtside monitor, when one is available. After a conclusion has been reached, the referee shall put the determined time on the game clock Play shall be resumed at the point where the ball was located when play was stopped to correct the timer’s mistake. In this case, B1 shall be awarded the entitled free throw(s) for A2’s personal foul and play shall be resumed from that point with the corrected time on the game clock. A correction is only permitted when it falls within the prescribed time frame limit as described in Rule 2-5.1.f and Rule 2-6.1.
__________________________________________________ _________________

Play 2: With 4 seconds remaining on the game clock, A1 makes a throw-in to A2. The game clock does not start when the throw-in is touched inbounds by A2. The ball is passed twice, a shot is taken and the rebound is tipped out of bounds by B1. Prior to placing the ball at the disposal of A1 for the throw-in, the official realizes that there are 4 seconds on the game clock indicating that the game clock was not started on the previous throw-in.
Ruling 2: Rule 2-6.1 states that when an obvious timing mistake has occurred because of failure to start or stop the game clock properly, the mistake shall be corrected only when the referee has definite information relative to the time involved. The officials have definite information that the game clock did not start. If a monitor were available, the officials would be permitted to go to the monitor to determine the correct time to be placed on the game clock if any time remains (2-5.1.f; A.R. 8). If a monitor were not available, the officials are to confer with each other and/or check with the official timer to determine the correct time to be placed on the game clock or if any time remains in the game. By rule, a decision must be made relative to the time involved. The officials are not permitted by rule to leave 4 seconds on the game clock and repeat the initial throw-in by A1. According to NCAA rules, there are no ‘do-overs’.

Additionally, this quote also appears in that bulletin:
"According to NCAA rules, there are no ‘do-overs’. Officials commit errors and timer’s make mistakes and only a select few of each are permitted by rule to be corrected. Officials must know which errors or mistakes are permitted by rule to be corrected and what time limits restrict those corrections."

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by Mark Dexter
If you didn't have a 10 second count, the throw-in is still from mid-court (nearest point to where the ball was when you blew the whistle), but unless you have definite knowledge, you leave the clock where it was. Since the ball was touched inbounds, you're not going to go all the way back to the baseline (i.e., no do-overs).

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Rule to back that up?

Originally Posted by Camron Rust

Team A advanced the ball to midcourt and should get the ball back at that spot no matter what else is done. That was the location of the ball when it became dead to address the clock issue.

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Here we go again....

I disagree completely. There is no rules backing for your statement above. Giving the offensive team half-court with no time taken off makes no sense at all- to me.However, there also is no rules backing for my take that it simply a do-over if there is no accurate count.

This play is not covered definitively under NFHS rules.

The rules are present and are very clear....I'll quote them...

Rule 7-4-4 The ball is awarded out of bounds after the ball becomes dead while a team is in control, provided no infraction or end of a period is involved, as in 7-5-4.

• So, the ball becomes dead at the whistle, right? Yes.
• Was team A in team control? Yes.
• Was there a goal or infraction involved? No.

Every element of 7-4-4 has been met and refers us to 7-5-4.

Rule 7-5-4...After a dead ball as in 7-4-4, any player of the team in control shall make the throw-in from the designated spot out-of-bounds nearest to the ball when it becomes dead.

Where does it say to take it out? Closest spot! Q.E.D.
Note there is no consideration for timing errors mentioned...corrected or not.

[Jurassic Referee]

Yup, all the same old lame arguments. And all the same old lame arguers insisting they're right without being able to offer any definitive rules backing for it.

Iow, same old, same old.......

[Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Yup, all the same old lame arguments. And all the same old lame arguers insisting they're right without being able to offer any definitive rules backing for it.

Iow, same old, same old.......

JR:

What was lame about Camron's latest post. He quoted all the pertinent rules that apply to this play. And these are the same rules that I have also quoted in a previous thread. The rules are clear in this case. There is no do over whether it is NFHS, NCAA, or FIBA in this play.

MTD, Sr.

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.

JR:

What was lame about Camron's latest post. He quoted all the pertinent rules that apply to this play. And these are the same rules that I have also quoted in a previous thread. The rules are clear in this case. There is no do over whether it is NFHS, NCAA, or FIBA in this play.

MTD, Sr.

I still completely disagree with you, Camron and Filibuster Freddy from Nevada, as well as anybody else that agrees with y'all. The rules that Camron cited are neither pertinent or relevant to this particular situation. You want to move the ball 60 feet or so up the court while saying that it took ZERO seconds to actually move the ball up those 60 feet. Heckuva idea.

The play is simply not definitively covered under NFHS rules. If you, Camron or anyone else wants to argue this for another 20 pages, hey, be my guest. Imo it's probably easier to dig up all the old, identical threads to this and read them, but hey, if you want to resurrect all the old inconclusive arguments, go ahead. WOBW though imo.

Same sh!t, different day......

[OHBBREF]

JR - Since the ball was in the back court there should have been a count so they seem to be talking about putting the ball in play at the spot of the dead ball with that time off the clock. I do not see a problem with that!

I do have a problem with do overs period-

Dave - I agree with Mark and Nevada here this is a game managment issue and I would in absence of specific NFHS coverage of the situation use the NCAA direction for this situation it is the simplest and fairest way to put the ball back in play and noone in the arena but you and your partner(s) knows if there was DEFINATE knowledge of the time that ran off the clock or not.

Discuss it - put the ball at the OOB point when the ball became dead and take time off the clock. Then Tasser the "Timer" and move on.

As a side note - I was instructed by a DIII assignor that when doing this it is better to give a number such as 10:28 - rather than 10:25 or 10:30 it gives the impression that you are on top of the situation rather than taking a guess.

[Scrapper1]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

The play is simply not definitively covered under NFHS rules.

I'm not going to get in the middle of this except to say that I think it IS covered definitively by the rules -- but poorly. Camron's argument is not debatable, IMHO. Ball's dead, team control, no foul = nearest spot.

That is a bad and unfair result, but it's the result that is dictated by the throw-in rules. Again, JMHO.

[JugglingReferee]

Originally Posted by OHBBREF

As a side note - I was instructed by a DIII assignor that when doing this it is better to give a number such as 10:28 - rather than 10:25 or 10:30 it gives the impression that you are on top of the situation rather than taking a guess.

I don't agree with this whatsoever. You put up the time that should be up. You don't add seconds or remove seconds to make it look better.

For every 5 times this happens, there is a 20% chance that the time to put on the clock ends in a 5 or a 0. It will happen that 10:30 is the correct time to put on the clock.

Back when I was doing provincial championships, a power-that-be told me to always put up an odd number - it looks more accurate. Back then I believed that philosophy. Now I think it's hogwash. You put up what it is. Nothing more, nothing less.

[Scrapper1]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

You put up the time that should be up. You don't add seconds or remove seconds to make it look better.

This assumes that you know the time that should be up. There are people who will say that even if you don't have definite knowledge, you should make up a number when the clock has obviously screwed up. And when you make up the number, you should not give a number that ends in 0 or 5, because it looks like you're just making it up. Those folks figure it's ok to make it up, as long as nobody knows that you're making it up.

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Scrapper1

I'm not going to get in the middle of this except to say that I think it IS covered definitively by the rules -- but poorly. Camron's argument is not debatable, IMHO. Ball's dead, team control, no foul = nearest spot.

That is a bad and unfair result, but it's the result that is dictated by the throw-in rules. Again, JMHO.

Skippy, with all due respect.....

[JugglingReferee]

What interests me is that when you take off x seconds - you're on average really taking off x.49 (9 repeating) seconds.

Here's my justification, for certain clocks:

When the display changes from 8:00 to 7:59 immediately at the beginning of a quarter, and not a second after the clock is started, there is really 7:59.99, .98, .97, .96, you get the idea remaining in the quarter. The upper limit is 7:59.9 (9 repeating). The lower limit is 7:59.0 exactly.

That difference is almost 1 full second. If the clock says 3:45 and you have to remove 6 seconds, then you are changing the clock to read 3:39 - which I'm certain the clock interprets as 3:39.0. If the clock memory is 3:45.98, then the resetting loses .98 seconds.

If you think that .98 seconds isn't much, ask Christian Laettner, Michael Jordan, or even the 1972 US Olympic team.

Edit:

I will propose a second auxiliary button on a scoreclock: Adjust. User presses Adjust, then 1 to remove seconds (or 3 to add), then the number of seconds to adjust the clock by.

My first additional button is called Factor. It works like this: you press Factor, then two digits such as 85, then Factor again. This tells the clock to remove a second from the display (and internal memory) every 0.85 seconds. Used in a blowout only, you can save 288s, or 4min 48s!!

[Dan_ref]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

I still completely disagree with you, Camron and Filibuster Freddy from Nevada, as well as anybody else that agrees with y'all. The rules that Camron cited are neither pertinent or relevant to this particular situation. You want to move the ball 60 feet or so up the court while saying that it took ZERO seconds to actually move the ball up those 60 feet. Heckuva idea.

The play is simply not definitively covered under NFHS rules. If you, Camron or anyone else wants to argue this for another 20 pages, hey, be my guest. Imo it's probably easier to dig up all the old, identical threads to this and read them, but hey, if you want to resurrect all the old inconclusive arguments, go ahead. WOBW though imo.

Same sh!t, different day......

Oh, I finally see what you're grumbling about.

In this play you simply can't magically move the ball to mid court without taking *some* time off the clock.

OTOH you cannot have a "do-over" by putting the ball back on the endline.

That leaves 1 answer: decide how much time to take off & put the ball where it was when you finally woke up & realized the clock never started.

[OHBBREF]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

I don't agree with this whatsoever. You put up the time that should be up. You don't add seconds or remove seconds to make it look better. [/U]

This philosphy only applies when there is not definate knowledge

With definate knowledge that it should be 10:38 you put 10:38 on the clock - if there is definate knowledge that it should be 10:40 then that is what you put on the clock.

[JugglingReferee]

Originally Posted by OHBBREF

This philosphy only applies when there is not definite knowledge

Sticky because by rule (I believe) we're not allowed to do that.

Dan's post is interesting.