pass off the backboard, into the backcourt

[Hawks Coach]

Originally posted by BktBallRef

I'm confused by this statement, Coach. Could you explain what you mean?

Let's start with the facts. You can't get a DD or a travel by passing off your own backboard. You can either treat this rule as some sort of exception to other rules, or view it in the context of other rules and consider it a clarification. I choose to do the latter. Let's eliminate this specific clarification in the rules for a second and consider two situations:

1. I dribble, I pick up the ball, I toss it off the backboard, I run and retrieve it - if this is not a try on goal, it is a self pass and therefore a travel or a double dribble (depending on how you intepret what has occurred).
2. I dribble, I pick up the ball, I throw it off the backboard, and it bounds back to me - if this is not a try on goal, it is a double dribble.

Now clearly I know that, by the rule cited above, you can't get a travel or a double dribble by "passing" off your own backboard. I have never seen it explicitly stated, but I believe that this ruling exists because if it is off your own backboard, it is a try on goal by rule (even if it all participants agree the ball was not intended to go in the goal when released). This ruling saves you from the messy interpretations of "was he really trying to score or just passing to himself?"

If you throw the ball up and miss everything, judgement must now come into play regarding whether or not this was a try. Hit some rim or backboard, you have a try, IMO.