Excessive Tiimeout -- No Official Notification

[Rusty Gilbert]

Curious question posed to me following a high school game last night.

Head coach of Team A, who trails by lots midway through 4th quarter, requests a its second timeout of the quarter, which is dutifully granted by the nearest official.

The coach of Team B goes wild, screaming that Team A is out of timeouts and that A cannot be awarded a timeout. (Of course, he is wrong!)

An official comes over to Team A coach and asks, "Did one of the officials come and tell you that you had no timeouts remaining after the one you called earlier in the quarter?" Team A coach said, "No."

Official goes to his 2 partners, polls them, and comes to the conclusion that, although the scorer had notfied the officials that Team A had been granted their final alloted timeout earlier in the fourth quarter, none of the officials had notified the team and its coach that they had no timeouts left.

Rule 2-11-6 spells out the notification requirements (scorer informs official who informs team and coach).

The officials determined that, even though they failed to make the team and coach notification as required by rule, a technical foul was still warranted. So a T was assessed, 2 free throws and the ball to B.

Was this correct or not?

How does this situation compare/correlate with the situation where a player commits fifth foul but the scorer does not inform officials (and consequently the coach is not informed), so the player remains in the game until discovery is later made (sixth foul, etc..)? Case book 10.5.3.

For example, there are rule-specific reporting requirements in each instance. And, at least in the latter situation, there is no "requirement" for the coach to self-report or self-police (coach may have known player's foul was #5, but coach had no obligation or expectation to remove player until "official notification" was made by officials).