Pass Goes Behind the Backboard, Through the Supports

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by Snaqwells

Because with the fan shape, it's hard to tell if it goes "over" or "beside".

It is no harder than for a rectangular backboard. The fan boards still have vertical edges on the sides....if the ball is inside of that, it is over the top.

My opinion...

Its a matter of likelihood in combination with the original reason for the rule. The rule came about when Wilt Chamberlain's team would lob a baseline throw-in over the board for him to slam in. If I'm not mistaken, the NBA and most, if not all of D1, had converted to rectangular backboards by his time. It was a completely indefensible play...so they made it illegal for the ball to cross over the top of the board. There is rarely a "normal" play where the ball also goes over a rectangular board. As for fan shaped boards...they're much smaller and it is much more likely for a ball to go over the top in the course of normal play. Not wanting to stop the game unnecessarily and knowing that fan boards were used in places not likley to be affected by Chamberlain-like players, there was no need to illegalize it for fan shaped boards.