Stopping Play for Injury
 

6th Grade Girls Tournament Game, A1 shoots and "fades" into a still defender, misses her shot, and falls to the ground. B1 gets rebound, fast breaks toward her basket, and misses her layup. After the first miss layup, I notice that A1 is still crying on the floor in the back court near her basket. After an offensive rebound (or 2) and missed layups, team A gets possession and we blow the play dead to attend to A1 who still underneath the other basket.

In between the 10 seconds I noticed that the girl was on the floor (indicated by screaming parents) and we blew it dead, I was I was struggling with blowing the whistle right away just in case the girl was having a heart attack/stroke vs. dealing with a coach who would definitely get on me for stopping play at that point.

Of course, I took hell from the parents with such comments like "you're going to get players hurt on there by not blowing your whistle.."

I agree that safety comes first, but there are other things to consider before just stopping play.

Another tangible is that the "injured player" is a 6th grade girl who had been "injured" a couple times during this game already. I was confident that she didn't have a severe injury, but obviously can't prove that either way without stopping play.

Is there a hard line on when to stop play? How would it change in youth vs. High School?

I'll give the offense one shot and then I'm stopping play, regardless of who gets the rebound. And if they're just working their offense, I won't even give them that.

You stopped play at the absolute CORRECT time. Also, at that level expect the parents to complain and expect to have the occasional coach run out on to the floor before beckoned. Welcome to the fun world of lower level rec ball!

I disagree, there's no reason for multiple rebounds. If the offense is driving for a layup or a score, let it play out. If they pull it out and start running their offense, kill it.

I once had something similar happen where the offense had an easy fast break and 9 kids are down running to one end and one is crying bloody murder. The coach instinctively ran on the court. Team missed the shot and once the rebound was secured I blew the play dead.

by rule this was wrong, but in this case I went with common sense as I felt in this instance a T would have been incorrect. Kid tore acl and mcl so I can imagine the pain wasnt pleasureable.

For some reason, I think I remember the direction is supposed to be to kill it as soon as the shot is released. AP if it's missed and ball to defense if it's made. I'm sure I'm off on this one, though.

For me it depends. In pregame, I cover injured players and how we should handle it. I tell my crews, if, in the official's judgment, a player is injured and looks like they require immediate attention, kill the play at that point regardless of what is happening. If, however, the official believes the injury does not require immediate attention, judge the play situation and decide whether it is an appropriate time to kill the play (no drive to the basket, no shot attempt, team just working it around, etc). The safety and health of the players is paramount to anything happening during play. Again, do you run the risk of a player "faking it", sure, but, I'd rather take that chance, when a player appears to require immediate attention (hit their head, screaming out in pain, very hard fall, etc). Just my opinion and I'm sure some will disagree.

Who gives a *** what the parents think? If you didn't feel she was in danger, leave it in play until team A gets the ball back.

Already in Rule 5-8-2 Note
 

You can pregame this, but the rules are clear in what to do. A player in immediate danger should have the game stopped for (judgment call). And if you feel they are not in immediate danger, you let the fast break continue especially if the team is on defense that has the injured player (judgment call). But I do not know why you need to pregame this; the rules are there in place to tell you what to do.

Peace

Rut, I agree it is covered in the rules but, I want to make sure that everyone on the crew is on the same page regarding when they should stop play and when we shouldn't. I've covered it when I am the "R" and I have had it covered when I was a "U" both in high school and college. Again, my rationale is it is one of those things that doesn't happen often but when it does, we should know how to handle it. It takes about 15 seconds of a pre-game. By the way, I haven't looked but, did you update the other post about how your tv game went?

All I am saying it is already in the rule. And since these are rare, every situation is going to be judged differently just because of the nature of these situations. And if your concern is that a kid will fake, this is why the rule is in place to allow the opponent to continue their movement to the basket. Nothing you have said is bad, but it is already covered and the covering officials will just have to make a decision. There really is no right or wrong here, but your judgment has to take over either way. I might look at a play and decide it is not serious and you may look at a play and decide it is serious. Whoever blows their whistle wins. ;)

Peace

+1

As stated, the rule cited gives us direction and it's then a judgment call.

And that's basically how we locally train our members to deal with situations like this.

In our local kids rec league, we have a coach's meeting prior to the season starting. One of the topics I cover with them is player safety. I tell them it's the number one priority and nothing else is even close. This is just a rec league for kids to have fun and if we think a kid is injured we stop play immediately. I tell the coaches we will do this even if there's three seconds left in the game, a team is down by one point and one of their players has an uncontested breakaway layup. I then tell them that if there's anyone here who disagrees with this philosophy, they shouldn't be coaching in this program. We instruct all our refs to officiate in this manner. In all my years here, never had a problem with this policy.

And yes - the kids' parents can come out on the floor.

You are correct young grasshopper. But you are not off. I am the only one that is off his rocker, :D.

MTD, Sr.

"You Are Correct Sir" (Ed McMahon)
 

5-8-2-Note: When a player is injured, the official may suspend play after the ball is dead or is in control of the injured player’s team or when the opponents complete a play. A play is completed when a team loses control (including throwing for goal) or withholds the ball from play by ceasing to attempt to score or advance the ball to a scoring position. When necessary to protect an injured player, the official may immediately suspend play.