TO situation

[ChuckElias]

New night, new crap.

Great D3 game. #19 in the region vs #20 in the region. Game is close the whole way. Visitors trail by as much as 11, then take the lead with about 5 minutes left. Home team comes back and takes a 5 point lead with just under a minute.

Visitors (trailing by 5) advance the ball into the frontcourt. I am table-side C and am standing directly in front of visitor's head coach. Point guard dribbles to the FT line and is double teamed. He's having trouble getting rid of the ball. Clock is at 00:38.5.

Spoken directly into my ear, I hear the head coach shout "Time out"

Tweet!!

And the coach finishes the sentence ". . .if we score!"

But I've already blown the whistle. Coach goes nuts. "I didn't call timeout!!" I have now created a horrible situation. What should have done. What we did was meet, then the R confirmed with the coach that he did not actually want the TO. We ruled it an inadvertant whistle.

Comments? Aside from the fact that I should've had a slower whistle.

Chuck

[BktBallRef]

What is the point of telling me that you want a TO "if we score?" Okay, why are you telling me? You're still going to have to make the request after you score.

[Dan_ref]

I think you handled it fine, at that point no one in their right mind is wondering what will happen "if he scores". They're all wondering if the point guard's gonna get rid of
the ball before you get to 5 seconds, or 3 seconds, or if
he'll just turn it over, and most of all they're all
wondering why the coach is not screaming for a time out!

[crew]

i got no problem with what you did. its in the rules that a coach can call time out. this is why coaches should not be able to be granted timeouts but players with a visible signal.

[zebraman]

Quick thinking... but once we grant a time-out, we can't take it back is how I was trained. Like Bktballref said, a coach can't ask for a time-out in the future ("if we score"), he can only ask for it at the point in time... so he has nobody to blame but himself. "You want a full or a 30 coach?"

Z

[just another ref]

This is probably the same coach who will complain if his player gets trapped, he yells TIME OUT, then a split second later there is a turnover. "Didn't you hear me yell TIME OUT?"

[JRutledge]

Originally posted by ChuckElias
New night, new crap.

Having a tough start of the season?

Peace

[ronald]

You heard the words time out from a person who had the authority to request one and you granted it. I think he may have pulled a fast one on your crew. You state that the player was having trouble getting rid of the ball and let's assume a five second call is in progress. Let's add who was he telling time out to if we score in that situation. Plus he was in your ear. You tweet immediately and he goes if we score. You made your decision but from the description I think he pulled a fast one. It will serve me to be prepared for something like this in the future.

I'm new to the forum although I have posted a few replies earlier. It is great to get various insights from other officials on how to handle various situations.

[Nevadaref]

Chuck,
I must agree 100% with Ronald on this one. You should have charged that coach with a time-out. Look at it this way. Is he trying to get an advantage by telling you this? I say yes. He certainly got an advantage from the way you ruled on the play since his guard was stuck. At the very least you negated a good defensive play and that wasn't fair either. But even if this result was not what he intended, this coach is trying to get you to look for something before it will happen. If you do this, he has done his job as an advocate for his team and has gotten a slight advantage.
I believe that a time-out request should be reacted to by the officials just like any other play in the game. You wouldn't look for a push or a travel just because a coach told you to do so. You might humor him, but then you would officiate the play fairly, just like you always do.
He should have to get your attention when he wants the TO not before. Any previous consideration you give him truly is advantageous.
Lastly, I know that this was college where the clock stops on the made basket in the last minute anyway, but this pre-telling of a TO would be an even greater advantage in a HS game as he could save some precious seconds on the clock!

[devdog69]

Definitely a tough situation. We are trying to balance between granting the TO asap before a turnover and making dern sure they want one. Only a couple of people would know for sure, but it does sound kinda fishy like he may have pulled a fast one. Thanks for sharing, may we all have hightened awareness for such situations. Btw, did anyone else see the official grant a TO to the trapped player late in the Duke game? Watching it live from the camera in the rafters it looked like a good call. They didn't have any TO's left and they started claiming they didn't request one, he stuck with it and gave them a tech, game was over anyway. But on the close-up replays, it didn't look like he ever requested a timeout, though his hands clasped together on the ball and that is when the official granted him a TO. Thinking maybe the official had a mometary lapse and forgot that they were out of timeouts, in which case he would have been very hesitant about granting one.

[ChuckElias]

Originally posted by JRutledge
Having a tough start of the season?

Not so much tough, Jeff. It's just that two nights in a row, I've had seemingly normal situations go almost irretrievably wrong. We handled them properly, I think, but it just frustrates me to have a wonderful game like last night and have this big SNAFU with 30 seconds left. Frustrating, more than tough. But yeah, it could be going better.

Originally posted by Nevadaref
Is he trying to get an advantage by telling you this? I say yes

I can only tell you that if he really wanted me to blow the whistle, then he deserves to be making movies, not coaching basketball. He would be one heckuvan actor. He was seriously pissed that I stopped the play. I would agree with you that he probably got an advantage out of it; it definitely took the pressure off his guard. But I honestly don't think he saw it that way. He was pissed.

And from the way I wrote it, maybe it sounds like there was a big pause between "Time out" and "if we score"; but there wasn't a big pause. He was just finishing his sentence, but I'd already blown the whistle. So he wasn't trying to sucker me into it. I suckered myself. (I think that's still illegal in 48 states!)

Chuck

[fletch_irwin_m]

Chuck,
I hate those sits. As I am learning this craft, I have a rule of having to hear Time Out more then one time from a coach. This gives me an out. In this situation he A) Could have finished his sentence and B) if the ball was stolen and he is calling for a time out you could CYA by blowing the whistle and say the TO was granted before the steal etc.
Of course after being given this pearl of wisdom from a senior official I am calling a nice tight game. Visitors down 3 about :20 left. 2-man crew I am trail, bench side. The visiting team has the ball, and their coach is yelling "TIME TIME TIME TIME" so what do I do? I blow the whistle and say "Time Red". NO player was asking for time and the coach was NOT making a TO symbol. He looks at me and asks why I gave him a TO. I said coach you were yelling "TIME". He was trying to communicate to his players that they had time on the clock and to be patient.
So we did what you did and called inadvertant whistle, visitors run a GREAT OB play for a 3 to send into OT.
Lovely.

[stripes14]

I belive that in high school if you grant a timeout that is unwanted that you have no choicr but to give the timeout.However in college you can call an inavertant whistle and continue on.I do think the coach should find a better way to let you know he wants a timeout after a score .
Stripes

[Troward]

stripes14 Can you please provide a rules reference for this interpretation as this would change everything.

Member

Registered: Dec 2002
Posts: 1
I belive that in high school if you grant a timeout that is unwanted that you have no choicr but to give the timeout.Stripes

[Hawks Coach]

Stripes
Parent in the stands is yelling time out, they are fans of my opponent, they are right next to my bench, you grant "my timeout request" - you now have no choice but to stick with that call in NFHS? Your interpretation would suggest this, but I am truly puzzled by this reasoning.