St. Mary's/Gonzaga rescinded INT
 

Did anyone else see this?
The ESPN highlight clip shows Gonzaga's #00, Robert Sacre, fouling St. Mary's #50, Omar Samhan, on an attempted dunk. The contact was on the arms and the fouled player fell awkwardly and hard into the padded supporting base of the basket.

The covering official was Rick Batsell, who immediately signaled an intentional personal foul, likely for excessive contact.

The officials then went to the monitor, probably to determine if the foul was flagrant, and upon resuming the game rescinded the intentional foul call and adminstered two FTs with the players along the lane for a normal personal foul.

I was surprised as my understanding of the monitor rules is that the determination of an intentional personal foul is not reviewable, and so the call on the court wouldn't have been effected by whatever the crew saw on the monitor.

I can only surmise that his partners talked him out of the initial decision. Anyone have any thoughts or insights?

I was watching the game live & was thinking that the intentional call should of stayed, as there seemed to be an intent to injure. I thought that the monitor review was only supposed to be used for last-second shots or clock reset reviews.

Please refrain from posting again in this thread for a couple of days. No offense, but I wish to hear from other officials who actually know and understand the rules. Your response is significantly incorrect in a couple of areas. 1. had there been an intent to injure, then the call would have been a flagrant foul, not an intentional. 2. the monitor can be used for much more than timing errors and last-second trys.

While other officials are posting in this thread, I would suggest that you go to the ncaa website, locate a copy of the rules, and read them. If you are interested in improving your basketball knowledge, then that would be a good use of your time.

I saw the play and the changed decision. I'm not sure what your question is. If the officials went to the monitor to evaluate whether the foul was flagrant, then that's correct procedure, right?

From what they saw, they determined that the foul didn't even have the excessive contact required for an intentional foul, much less being flagrant. Likely the calling official misjudged based on the violent outcome of the play.

At that point, the officials confronted a choice: ignore the information and enforce the (in their revised opinion) incorrect call, or use the information and change the call. They chose the latter.

So, here's another question: if it's legitimate to check the monitor to see whether a foul is flagrant, why isn't it legitimate to check whether a foul is intentional?

The part in red is my question. Is that in fact what they did?

The answer to the part in black is because reviewing fouls with the courtside monitor which were deemed intentional on the court to determine if they really were is currently not permissible under the NCAA rules.

I don't think you can answer the first question without speaking to the officials.

Isn't it possible that they reviewed the monitor for the purpose of evaluating whether the foul was flagrant (permissible), and they learned that it wasn't even intentional?

Do the rules determine not only the situations in which officials may consult the monitor, but also how that information is to be used?

Yes.

I don't know for sure whether they can rescind an intentional foul call from what they see on the monitor - my understanding has been that they can't but I'm not an NCAA official and haven't reviewed those rules recently - but the rules do dictate what is permissible to change based on replay and what is not.

Perhaps, and this is just a guess, but perhaps this official used the "X" to signal flagrant, as we've seen a lot of officials do. This would make the review and subsequent "reversal" completely legal.

Interesting thought...would make sense.

Or perhaps the off official consulted with the calling official prior to the monitor review and gave a contrary opinion (no, that wasn't intentional) and the calling official changed his own call without aid of the monitor. And then they used to monitor to ensure it wasn't flagrant (this part makes little sense, but who knows).

As you can see by my writing, the officials can do pretty much whatever they want as long as they get their explanation straight. ;)

This emphasizes the need for excellent communication among the crew. :D

This was actually my first thought. :)

And if intentional (excessive contact) can't be reviewed, it's one that should be reviewable. If flagrant / non-flagrant can be, there's no reason why this shouldn't be, either.

Maybe he used the "X" signal to indicate an "Xtra" hard foul? ;)

Below is what I just pulled off the online pdf version of the NCAA rules concerning use of the video equipment.


1. When there is a foul called for contact, the officials, with a
plausible reason, may review the severity of that foul during the
dead ball period following the call. When the ball becomes live,
there shall be no further review of the made call.

The way I understand it, the monitor can be used to "upgrade" to a flagrant foul, or see if one occured that was possibly missed, but I believe one of the interps I saw said you cannot "downgrade" a foul once it's called.

The interp I read regarding the use of the monitor involving flagrant fouls from the NCAA-W side says:
Ruling 1: This foul cannot be downgraded. The intent of Rule 2-13.2.d is not to use the monitor to verify an already determined foul. Rule 2-13.2.d specifically states that the monitor can be used to determine IF a contact flagrant foul occurred. When officials determine that a contact flagrant foul DID occur, then the call stands and that flagrant foul cannot be ‘downgraded’. When officials are not sure IF a contact flagrant foul occurred, they are permitted to use the monitor to determine If the contact foul (observed or not observed) was flagrant. Per Rule 2-13.2.d, officials are reviewing the monitor to determine IF a contact flagrant foul occurred and “when it is determined that a contact flagrant foul did not occur but an intentional personal or a player-substitute technical foul for dead ball contact did occur, those fouls shall be penalized accordingly.” The key is to review the monitor to determine if the foul is flagrant because once it is determined to be flagrant, it cannot be reviewed or ‘downgraded.’

So, as I read it, if the call was orginally an intentional, and they check the monitor to see if it should be "upgraded" to a flagrant (or intentional personal), and they determine it was not a flagrant, they cannot also change the original call to something less.

Interesting, last night Duke/Clemson had the same situation, an intentional was called and crew huddled, reviewed it, and stuck with call. Not knowing NCAA rules, I had no idea it was reviewable.

Fixed it for you... But I did see the play last night and even as a Duke fan (let the berating begin) I did not think it was an intentional foul. It was a play that had a lot of speed and momentum and players went down hard. But I do not think there was any ill intent or that the contact was excessive based on the type of play going to the hole.

I did however throw up in my mouth as I had to listen to the dumba$$ announcers once again spout off at the mouth vehemently disagreeing with the call and saying over and over again that the defender made a play at the ball.... When will these talking heads ever understand that "making a play on the ball" is not necessarily relevant to calling an intentional foul.

Puke.

As a Wake Forest fan, I too disagreed with the call after looking at the replay, but the calling official (Natili, maybe?) was right there and had a good look at it. But I too was interested that they went to the monitor. I can't see them possibly looking to upgrade to a flagrant, so maybe they were looking to downgrade. All purely speculation though.

All I can find in the NCAA book is that officials can go to the monitor to determine the severity of the foul. IIRC, this is a new rule that was implemented in the middle of last season in response to some "high profile" elbow incidents. The rule seems open enough to allow the downgrading of an intentional foul, but perhaps there is an NCAA interpretation to the contrary.

Also didn't think it was intentional, and not knowing the rule, a previous post mentioned you can only 'upgrade' a foul not downgrade it. I was getting sucked in by announcers who said the review was to see if it was going to be downgraded. What's the skinny?

oops...
 

In this situation, when an intentional was called on the floor, the officials can go to the monitor to review if in fact the foul should have been a flagrant foul. They must review this play before the ball becomes live again. Upon review, they only have 3 options.
1. upgrade to a flagrant
2. stick with the intentional
3. decide that there was no foul on the play (for example, if it was actually a teammate that knocked over their own player....obviously not the case here)

There are NO options here that allow you to downgrade to a regular shooting foul and not an intentional. If the play happened as described, this was done incorrectly.