Nfhs 4-40-7
 

Can someone describe the situation mentioned here where there is "severe" contact on a screen but it is uncalled b/c incidental? secondly, i can't imagine letting it go without having one mad coach.

A player who is screened within the visual field is expected to avoid contact by going around the screener. In cases of screens outside the visual field, the opponent may make inadvertent contact with the screener and if the opponent is running rapidly, the contact may be severe. Such a case is to be ruled as incidental contact proved the opponent stops or attempts to stop on contact and moves around the screen, and provided the screener is not displaced if he has the ball.

The wording pretty well describes the situation. A blind screen in which the screened player tries to stop upon contact. The screener can be knocked down pretty hard and it shouldn't be a foul.

"Coach, it was a blind screen. He tried to stop, and that's all the rules require."

If they don't like it, they'll stop setting blind screens.

Or the screened player could get crushed by a completely legal screen from a much bigger player and maybe even injured because he never saw the screen and his teammates didn't tell him about it.

ubsfanllw:

Assuming the the player setting the blind has met the requirments for setting a blind screen it means that the moving player being screened is to stop instantly upon making contact with the player setting the blind screen. If the player being screened goes through the screener the contact is a foul by the screened player.

MTD, Sr.


P.S. The Law of Conservation of Momentum governs in this play and I have yet to see a screened player who is running at top speed stop instantly upon coming into contact with the player who was setting the blind screen because the contact between the two players was not a completely (100%) elastic collision; in fact it is almost always a completely inelastic collision.

I'll go ahead and pick the nit.

He is not required to stop; he is required to "attempt to stop." There's a big difference.

He's also allowed to displace the screener in this case of a blind screen without committing a foul as long as the screener does not have the ball.

NevadaRef:

I agree with you 100% that the moving player (screened player) can displace the stationary player (stationary screener); that will happen in a completely elastic collision: The momentum between the two players will be conserved with the screener moving off at the velocity of the screened player had before the collision and the screened player will stop instantly upon contact.

But collisions between human bodies are rarely 100% elastic. Therefore, if the moving player does not stop on contact, i.e., he continues on throught the screener the screened player has committed a foul.

MTD, Sr.