Rec league rule dilemma

[jeffpea]

is the game at this age group moving "so fast" as to prevent officials (regardless of experience) from turning their head to "see" a coach calling a time-out?

[Mark Padgett]

Thanks everyone. We're having a rules committee meeting in a few days and a Board meeting next week. If anything interesting comes out of all this, I'll post it.

If I had to bet (Tim Donaghy, are you listening?), I'd say we're probably going to allow the HC to request a TO from the bench in grades 5 and up but leave it the way it is in grades 3 and 4. Other things we're considering include reducing the number of timeouts allowed (we only have the gyms for a certain amount of time and games have been running long), having the 6th grade boys use a 30" ball instead of a 28.5" (and keeping 3rd thru 5th boys with the "small" ball) and allowing a coaching box at all grade levels, which is something we've never allowed in over 30 years. I don't think that last one is going to get anywhere.

[26 Year Gap]

Our pipe dream for NFHS is for coaches to only be able to call time-out during a dead ball [as was suggested by an earlier poster]. This would allow your younger officials to focus on the players during live ball situations and yet be aware of the allowances in high school games and those adhering to Federation rules. It would still require coaches to relay information to players on the court and the players would have to be aware of that as well.

[CoachCER]

Originally Posted by Mark Padgett

Thanks everyone. We're having a rules committee meeting in a few days and a Board meeting next week. If anything interesting comes out of all this, I'll post it.

If I had to bet (Tim Donaghy, are you listening?), I'd say we're probably going to allow the HC to request a TO from the bench in grades 5 and up but leave it the way it is in grades 3 and 4. Other things we're considering include reducing the number of timeouts allowed (we only have the gyms for a certain amount of time and games have been running long), having the 6th grade boys use a 30" ball instead of a 28.5" (and keeping 3rd thru 5th boys with the "small" ball) and allowing a coaching box at all grade levels, which is something we've never allowed in over 30 years. I don't think that last one is going to get anywhere.

Do you use a running clock? We have in our 7th-8th grade league for 12 years (10 minute quarters, 5 time outs, clock stops for the last 2 minutes of the 4th quarter only) and games take right around 55 minutes. Our lower leagues all have slightly different clock rules, but I think all will be changed to match this season. I am toying with the idea of reducing the timeouts to 4 (2 full, 2 30).
Is there any special reason for moving the 6th grade boys to the 30" ball? It really isn't an option for us due to our larger travle organizations all using that size ball, but I was just wondering what the thinking is behind the change.
One of my board members is an official (and also a former high school coach) and his project this year is training our high school-aged referees and he also helped me revamp our code of conduct.

[Mark Padgett]

Originally Posted by CoachCER

s there any special reason for moving the 6th grade boys to the 30" ball?

Quite a few parents have mentioned that if they're going to buy their 6th grade son a ball, they wouldn't buy a 28.5. The main reason we've been using the small ball at that level is that we have the same rules for 5th and 6th graders and we felt that if we changed one size, we'd have to change them both and the 30" just seems too big for the 5th graders. However, I don't think it would be a big deal to have just this one difference.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by Mark Padgett

Quite a few parents have mentioned that if they're going to buy their 6th grade son a ball, they wouldn't buy a 28.5. The main reason we've been using the small ball at that level is that we have the same rules for 5th and 6th graders and we felt that if we changed one size, we'd have to change them both and the 30" just seems too big for the 5th graders. However, I don't think it would be a big deal to have just this one difference.

Too bad for the parents. Use the approprate sized ball even if they want to be cheap and buy ahead for the next year. Chances are that they will already have a ball before 6th grade anyway.