6 Players...Whose Responsibility Is It?

[Freddy]

Rule 10-1-6 stipulates that having more than 5 players participating simultaneously merits a team technical. The assumption that could be drawn from that is that it is the team's responsibility not to have more than five players on the floor when the ball becomes live.

The Officials' Manual says, "The officials shall count the players prior to putting the ball in play." The assumption that could be drawn from that is that it is the officials' responsibility that neither team have more than five players on the floor when the ball becomes live.

Twice in two weeks, once while observing and once in a game I was officiating, the ball became live -- then a whistle goes off because a sixth player was still on the court, not aware that he had been subbed for. Both times the officials did kind of a "my bad", and did a do-over, citing their responsibility to have the proper number of players on the floor. Each time the coach with the proper number of players griped that the other team should've been given a T, which didn't happen.
OK, so it's the officials' fault; they never should have made the ball live until 5 of each team were on the floor. No wait, they thought there were 5 for each team, but they miscount or whatever and one team gets stuck with six.

QUESTION: "NFHS, which is it gonna be? Is this the team's responsibility or the officials'? Make up your mind!"

Do I have a legitimate gripe? Or am I just suffering mid-winter light depravation?

[deecee]

you are just suffering. the officials shall count the players but in no way is it their responsibility for an incorrect number on the court.

[BktBallRef]

There's no contradiction here, nor does the NFHS need to "make up their mind." You should count the players. But it's still a T if it happens.

In both of the games you witnessed, the officials set aside a rule for a mechanic. They were wrong.

[just another ref]

Something I've never seen before happened last night. VB

We had a delay while the table had a question: "Who was the last foul on?" 32 "No, not the one just now, the last foul." Oh, uh..........45 That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Meanwhile, multiple subs had reported for both teams. Got the book straight. Preparing for free throws. Counted players. 6 for visitors. Hold up 6 fingers to visitors coach. He yells at a player to come out. Count again. Still 6. Coach calls another player out. A minute later we have a timeout. After the timeout, I count. Visitors have......7 players. "Uh, coach....." He jumped up, screamed at 2 players (same 2, I think) to come out, then chewed their butts on the bench while they sat and looked uninterested. I submit this is a case where the extra player could easily slip by us. I think the reason we didn't count 7 the first time is because when you reach 6 you tend to stop counting. Oops, they have too many. Also, once the coach has been notified he has too many, I would not consider it a huge oversight if the officials did not count again. Fortunately, in this case we did.

Originally Posted by Freddy

The Officials' Manual says, "The officials shall count the players prior to putting the ball in play." The assumption that could be drawn from that is that it is the officials' responsibility that neither team have more than five players on the floor when the ball becomes live.


Do I have a legitimate gripe? Or am I just suffering mid-winter light depravation?

on every game, however, in your pregame conference you should discuss, as I do, that the non-administering official should count the players (5 on 5, not 10) before acknowledging the administering official with eye contact to place the ball at the disposal of the thrower.

[CMHCoachNRef]

Originally Posted by Freddy

QUESTION: "NFHS, which is it gonna be? Is this the team's responsibility or the officials'? Make up your mind!"

Do I have a legitimate gripe? Or am I just suffering mid-winter light depravation?

Freddy,
As you have seen by now, the answers are quite clear.

If a team has more than five (to cover JARs situations of seven) players on the court at ANY TIME while the ball is live, a technical foul is to be assessed against the offending team. It is the officials responsibility -- per the manual -- to ensure that only five players for each team are on the floor before putting the ball back in play. It is the team that is penalized for violating this rule.

From my perspective, if a team has more than five players on the court at the same time because one or two players randomly run onto the court during play, shame on the coach. If the team has more than five players on the court at the same time because the officials failed to count players before putting the ball in play, shame on the officiating crew.

UNFORTUNATELY, while the shame is on the officiating crew in the second situation, the team is penalized for breaking the rule. This is the way that the rules are written. To enforce the rule any other way gives the opposing team a legitimate reason to gripe. In essence, if the officials fail to penalize this with a technical foul, the officials have shortchanged the opposition. I was that opposing coach several times in my coaching career.

Could the NFHS change the rule to put 100% of the responsibility on the officials? Well, yes they could (except for the player running on to the court during a live ball). But, the problem is, how would you handle the situation where you end up with six players on the court (as happened in an NBA game recently)? How do you know for sure how long the sixth player was out there? How would you know for sure whether the player joined play during a live ball or had been in since the previous dead ball? Would you wipe out the results and reset the clock? How would it be handled?

While the current rules are not perfect, they are probably the best they can be in this case. LESSON: Count and double-count players (we typically have two of us count the players as they are coming on the court -- that means BOTH of us in 2-man and two of us in 3-man) to make sure that each team has five and only five players. It is better to delay the restart by a couple seconds than to have an extra player or than to be short a player. This is just good game management. When you happen to catch a team with four, six or seven players on the court BEFORE the ball is put back into play, the coaches are quite appreciative.

[beachbum]

I know this will meet with some resistance from officials, but part of the problem is the lakidasical way players exit the court when subbed for. The official determining the number of players on the floor must wait a period of time before counting each team substituting. many times it is as much as 10 seconds.

If there was a 5 second count, and then the official counted the number of players on the floor, he or she could administer a penalty for more than 5 players to the offending team. This would place more burden on the coaching staff to get the players off quickly.

after a short time coaches would train the kids to get off quickly, and we would have less problems to deal with.

[golfdesigner]

Taking it just a little further. How many times do we have substitutions during a game, let's say 60 times. If it takes two or three seconds to take the time at each substitution period to check the count of players, 60 x 3-seconds oh boy a whole three minutes longer, so they game takes three more minutes. That's why it's important to take the time to make sure you have the right number of players on the floor. A whole three minutes to make sure you don't have to 'splain to the coach how come you're not assessing the T to the team with six or more. My opinion, no excuse. If you think you want to get 'em back playing again, do the math, it's well worth the few seconds to avoid an embarrasing situation.

[CMHCoachNRef]

Originally Posted by beachbum

I know this will meet with some resistance from officials, but part of the problem is the lakidasical way players exit the court when subbed for. The official determining the number of players on the floor must wait a period of time before counting each team substituting. many times it is as much as 10 seconds.

If there was a 5 second count, and then the official counted the number of players on the floor, he or she could administer a penalty for more than 5 players to the offending team. This would place more burden on the coaching staff to get the players off quickly.

after a short time coaches would train the kids to get off quickly, and we would have less problems to deal with.

beachbum,
While I can see your point, here, I cannot agree with it. We have enough counts already. When would the five count start? When the sub is beckoned? When the player is notified? What if the sub has a slight injury? How will you decide if there is an injury? We have more than enough opportunities to ruin the flow of a game with a technical foul. I don't want one more.

I am never in that big of a rush to get the game over that an extra 5 seconds (even if it happens 50 -- yes FIFTY -- times in a game, we are only talking about 250 seconds or a whopping four minutes!!!). In reality, it probably happens 5 - 10 times in a game resulting in an additional 25 to 50 SECONDS of elapsed time. Not enough for me to even think about administering a technical foul (taking at least 25 to 50 seconds to administer -- never mind the change of "tone" in the game).

[Jurassic Referee]

My, oh my.....more paralysis by analysis.

1) It is the head coach's responsibility to ensure that he has the proper number of players on the court. It is NOT the responsibility of the officials and it NEVER has been the responsibility of the officials.
2) Yes, we as officials try to ensure that the proper number of players are on the court. However, sometimes sh!t happens. It happened in an NBE game t'other week and all three officials missed it. If it does happen, just damn-well deal with it instead of going through these stoopid, non-sensical blame games. We've got very explicit rules in place to deal with these situations. When in doubt, it's not a bad idea to try using those rules.

Lah me.....

[BktBallRef]

Originally Posted by golfdesigner

A whole three minutes to make sure you don't have to 'splain to the coach how come you're not assessing the T to the team with six or more.

Please explain to me where I can find the rule that says a T is not assessed if the officials fail to count the 6 players?

[Adam]

I had this in a varsity game two weeks ago. TO, we resume play, and I hear the V coach behind me. "That's a technical foul, they have 6." He said it quietly a couple of times (I was C). Just as H6 starts running off the court, I hit the whistle.

Home coach wanted to know if we weren't suppose to count. I basically gave him Jurassic's answer. "Yes, coach, we are supposed to count; but it's your responsibility to have the right number of players on the court."

[Adam]

Originally Posted by golfdesigner

A whole three minutes to make sure you don't have to 'splain to the coach how come you're not assessing the T to the team with six or more.

It's easier to explain to the offending coach why you called the T than to explain why you're not calling what you should be calling. I'd also much rather explain that to my assigner/supervisor. The fact is, either way you missed the count; how does ignoring the rule make you in less trouble?

[IREFU2]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

My, oh my.....more paralysis by analysis.

1) It is the head coach's responsibility to ensure that he has the proper number of players on the court. It is NOT the responsibility of the officials and it NEVER has been the responsibility of the officials.
2) Yes, we as officials try to ensure that the proper number of players are on the court. However, sometimes sh!t happens. It happened in an NBE game t'other week and all three officials missed it. If it does happen, just damn-well deal with it instead of going through these stoopid, non-sensical blame games. We've got very explicit rules in place to deal with these situations. When in doubt, it's not a bad idea to try using those rules.

Lah me.....

I agree here, its the coaches job to do this. We do it as part as of our game management.

[mbyron]

Originally Posted by Snaqwells

It's easier to explain to the offending coach why you called the T than to explain why you're not calling what you should be calling. I'd also much rather explain that to my assigner/supervisor.

Agree.

Originally Posted by Snaqwells

The fact is, either way you missed the count; how does ignoring the rule make you in less trouble?

Disagree. Sometimes you count correctly, and then you look up and there are 6 on the floor. Players and coaches have strange ideas, and this T is not always a failure of game management. :shrug:

Bob had the best line in another thread, about how officials have a duty to count before putting the ball in play, but that it was the coaches' responsibility to have the right number on the court.