Here is the quote I object to:

Of course it is. The T is for someone going where they are not permitted or authorized to be. Plain and simple.

What would happen if a parent burst into the OR to be with his/her child during surgery at a hospital? The police/security would likely be called and the person would be removed, and depending upon the conduct and resistance it's possible that criminal charges could be filed. There are rules and regulations which are in place and need to be followed even in the face of injury to loved ones.

People here seem to be saying, "My kid is hurt," equates to "throw all the rules out the window." That's not how our society works in daily life, and it shouldn't be any different on the basketball court.

Did somebody delete a post? I don't follow any of this.

Look, my point was I realize I don't belong in the OR because I wouldn't know my nut from my eyeball in there. I also realize that parental rights may or may not conflict with basketball rules, so often times a parent will have to choose between insisting on their rights and avoiding punishment in the gym.

There are a few things that I'm saying in this.

1. I have the right as a parent to be down there. Whether that's the right, proper, or "legal" (WRT basketball rules) thing to do is irrelevant.
2. If I decide to do it, don't get in my way.
3. As an official, I'm not going to call a T on a parent here. If they verbally accost me or my partners, I'll have GM remove them. If they tend to their child, I'll leave it up to GM to decide what to do.
4. Just because you can squeeze the situation into a rule for a T doesn't mean you should.

Sorry, I deleted mine without thinking. I mentioned that I wouldn't be in the OR because of sterility reasons. It wasn't the only reason, but it may have been the only reason I gave.

Yeah, it appears that Snaqwells changed post #104 while I was responding to it. He had originally written that he couldn't be in the OR because he would ruin the sterility of the environment.

You would issue another T for that?

All the rules? No The rule you are trying to apply to the situation? Yes

In other words, would allow the medical personnel the room needed to perform their duties without direct interference. When I said "be one" I was meaning be side-by-side to their injured child with direct interference to medical personnel. There always are extenuating circumstances, no matter how a person sees things. However, a person of sound mind & judgement would allow the medical personnel the room needed to perform their duties for the treatment of the injured.

A parent running out onto the court to be by the side of their injured child, is not considered at the time to be of sound mind & judgement.

A parent can still be involved in the decisions of a child's medical treatment without being right there directly next to the child.

Our stances on this are more similar than they are different.
We both realize that parents don't belong in certain places and that applies to hospitals as well as basketball courts.
Neither of us as an official is going to get into a parents way if they decide to charge out onto the court to reach an injured child.
Where we differ is in what we are going to do afterward.
I'm going to have GM remove the individual for sure, and most likely will assess a team technical foul. I'm not leaving the decision of what to do up to GM. It is the official's space which has been violated here.
If the spectator decides to accost any of the officials while being out on the court, I am certainly assessing a technical foul and might even forfeit the game, depending upon what the official was subjected to. For example, if physical contact occurred, then I would deem that the school administration has failed to provide a safe environment for the officials to conduct the athletic activity, and terminate the contest.

I feel that we as officials allow too much garbage from spectators and parents. I've grown sick of it and far less tolerant over the years. I'm tired of seeing the level of sportsmanship decline and believe that it is high time that we take action and do something about it. You will likely note this sentiment throughout many of my responses in various threads. Why people in our society believe that an athletic contest is an open invitation to be abusive to others is beyond my comprehension, but it is unquestionable that many think that way and act that way.

One wouldn't hear an adult yelling nasty things at a 16 year-old girl in the supermarket, but because she happens to be wearing a uniform with the name of the opposing school on the front of it she is somehow worse than a communist dictator and can be subjected to all sorts of indignities.

I guess that I have just become jaded in my old age, but I'm tired of it.

Maybe it was chseagle's statement "If I was working crowd control in this situation, I would physically put myself between the parent & the student-athlete so that they could not become one until after removed from the court."
or yours "I won't but security might."


Actually they are very much related. Preventing a parent immediate access to the child in order to gain the information they may need in order to make decisions, in and of itself violates that right.

The bottom line is that basketball rules are just that - they have no legal standing. By contrast, the rights I've referred to are derived from portions of the 1st, 4th, 5th, 9th and 14th amendments to the constitution and numerous case law decisions dating back to the early 1900's.

The game is already interrupted for the injury. A parent entering solely to evaluate the nature and extent of an injury to their child is not disrupting anything, and in reality may help the situation resolve more quickly. T away if you want - by rule you can.....just be prepared to be crucified in the court of public opinion.

Anyway, I'm done here...this one's been flogged enough!

So what does that part have to do with a parent coming down to check on their kid, and says NOTHING to the officials?

I was watching a game recently and a player from the Visitors rolled an ankle after trying for a rebound. When the officials stopped play, the trainer and coach were beckoned on the court. The player's father walked out of the stands and along the endline to check on her. It was a fairly severe sprain as he and a police officer helped her to the locker room. The parent didn't say anything to the officials and didn't even look at them.

So with your logic Nevada, you would have the parent removed from the gym, and assess a team technical for that? You may do things drastically different in your neck of the woods, but I'm 99 percent sure that if a T was given in the above situation locally, the officials involved would be in serious dog doo-doo with the association.

If a parent comes out of the stands to check on their kid and says anything to the officials, the situation changes completely.

Rules reference?

The T or not to T reference is Rule 2-8-1. As the parent coming onto the floor without being summoned is considered unporting behavior by a spectator, altugh extuating circumstances are the cause.

Basically kind of a cause & effect, with the cause being a child getting injured & the effect being the parental instinct to check on their child by going out onto the court.

That is absolute BS. Seriously - stick to running the clock. You have no concept of the intent or understanding of the rules from an official's perspective. In many ways, you are more wrong than 'representing' to be giving any advice here in this forum.

In the case of an injured player, the game is already stopped. There is no orderly progress of the game at that point. Penalizing the team with a T is the absolute wrong thing to do if the parent is only attending to their injured child. What problem does this solve? How does this, in any possible way, make the game better?

As I stated beforehand, the parent going out onto the floor is a cause & effect.

True, the game has been stopped, but how often in situations of a student-athlete being injured, is a parent actually summoned to come down for assistance?

How wluld the NCAA or NBA/WNBA handle the situation if a player was injured & the player's parent(s) came rushing to their side in the middle of the court?

Same thing can be asked of NFL, MLB, NASCAR, MLS, NHL, IFL, AF1, WWE, TNA, & other sports officials, no matter what the sport is.

For example: what would happen if David Stockton (son of John Stockton) got injured when Gonzaga was playing against the University of Portland, & John (his father) came rushing down onto the court to be by his son's side although he wasn't summoned/given permission?