What would you have done?
Had a play the other night that I can't find any rule reference for. Wondering if there is one. If not, wondering what you would do.....
Girls Varsity Game. Team B scores a basket. After the ball passes through the net, it bounces under the basket on the out-of-bounds side of the endline. Clearly, the ball is at the disposal of the thrower. Team A has some confusion about who will inbound the ball. I wait a solid two seconds after the ball is at the disposal for someone to come and be the thrower before I start my five second count. As I get near four in the count, a player from Team A finally picks up the ball, and then throws it toward me to "check" the ball (like you would after a violation or foul). I chose to step out of the way and allow the ball to bounce past me. I completed the five second count and called Team A for the violation. Team A coach clearly didn't like this. Later, when he mentioned it again and I had the opportunity to explain,
I told him that I was at four in my count and that I believe that she passed the ball to me to attempt to get me to restart my count. (You might suggest that I catch the ball and pass it back to her while continuing my count, but I didn't feel like I could catch the ball without stopping the visual arm count. I was concered that if I actually reached 5 without the visible count and then call five seconds, it would have given more reason for him to dislike the call.) He told me that she wasn't smart enough to toss the ball toward me with that intent.
What would you have done?
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