3.3.6 D: A5 is injured as the horn sounds to end the first quarter and the coach is beckoned by an official on to the court to attend to A5.

Ruling: The intermission should begin when A5 is removed from the court. No substitute is required when A5 is ready to play to start the second quarter.
When A5 is not ready, a substitute should report before the warning horn or a timeout may be requested by Team A to keep A5 in the game.

So if the player here can remain in the game without spending a timeout, I don't see why the player in the OP can't stay in as well.


The question in the above case: What if A5 is not ready, and a timeout won't make him ready, but no sub reported before the warning horn? Do we have to charge Team A with a timeout anyway?

Completely disagree.

There is no unfair advantage being given.

The player with symptoms of a concussion needs to be further evaluated by appropriate health care professional. The player with blood does not. Two separate rules there.

Sitch/Question: A coach calls a timeout and as a player is walking to his bench you notice blood on his arm. Are you saying that you will not allow that player to return at the conclusion of the timeout provided that the blood situation has been taken care of?

Different scenario but...I will tell the coach that player has to have the blood situation taken care of by the end of the time out or he/she needs to be subbed out.

And you're right, there are two separate rules governing these situations. Both say the player must leave but one allows the player to return without medical evaluation.

Back to the situation in the OP: A1 is removed for the concussion situation. B1 is allowed to stay in the game. The coach of Team A says "Hey, B1 was supposed to go out too because he was bleeding/had blood on him." The response would be...?

The response would be, "Coach we stopped play when A1 displayed signs of a concussion. The blood situation with B1 was discovered during this stoppage and taken care of before we were ready to resume play." The stoppage in play was because A1 was injured and had nothing to do with B1.

And I don't see what's different about my scenario and the OP. The title of the thread is "blood discovered DURING a TO." If play is already stopped for an issued TO or an injury TO and during that TO blood is discovered on another player then that player would be eligible to remain in the game provided the blood situation was corrected prior to when we were ready to resume play.

That's what I'm doing in my games until one of my assignors directs otherwise.

No offfense to Scooby but the title of the OP should be "Blood discovered during a dead ball" or "Blood discovered while another player is injured." There's no time out in play in the OP. There's also nothing in the NFHS rule book that allows a player to remain in the game if a blood situation is corrected within a certain time frame unless that player's team calls time out.

There are also case plays in which A1 and B1 are injured and their respective coaches - after being beckoned - want to keep them in the game. The rules require that each coach uses a time out to do so. The situation in the OP is only slightly different in that A1's return isn't subject to the time out parameter.

There is no charged timeout but we essentially have an "injury timeout" and stoppage in play.

The rule says the player shall be directed to leave the game. In the OP's situation the player was directed to leave the game. It just so happened that it was during a stoppage of play for another situation. I see nothing in the rules that mandates B1 must remain out of the game if the blood situation has been corrected before play is ready to resume.

The case plays you reference are not relevant because play was stopped and coaches were beckoned FOR those injured players. In the OP situation play was not stopped FOR B1.

I think it's as simple as applying common sense to the rule. Again, what purpose is served by forcing the player to remain out of the game if the blood situation has been remedied before play, which has been stopped for another reason, is set to resume?

IMO you have a way too narrow interpretation of the rule that defies common sense. But we can just agree to disagree.

Once a player is directed to leave (and the coach hasn't taken a TO), they can't return until the clock has run.

I still argue that if the player is "directed to leave" for blood during an extended stoppage in play for another reason then that player can "return" provided the situation has been remedied by the time play resumes.

Is that exception explicitly spelled out in the rules book? No. But again every single variable of every situation does not have specific language or a case book play to address it. Sometimes we have to use common sense and apply the rule intelligently to a given situation.

IMO this is one of those instances. Not everyone agrees with me and that's fine. This is what I have done and will continue to do until directed otherwise.

I'm looking at it this way. If a stoppage of any kind is already in progress, there is no "game" for the player to leave. I see a kid standing in the huddle with blood on his arm. Before I can say anything, the trainer wipes off the blood and applies a bandage. By the time the "game" resumes, he's ready to go.

Isn't a timeout a part of the game? Maybe so, but even if it is, the player doesn't have to leave it.

I agree with this take.

Peace

I think all of us would probably handle your situation this way. But your situation is different than the OP and VaTerp's point...in both of those the player was directed to leave the game. The rules on that player coming back in are clear - wait for time to run or call a timeout. VaTerp is going to handle it his own way, which is fine for him, but he has no basis within the rules to do it that way and is contradicting what the rules say.

The OP doesn't say the player was directed to leave.

I think me and JAR are basically saying the same thing.

I fail to see how what I am saying has no basis within the rules or that it contradicts the rules but whatever.

It does say that his partner told the coach...wonder what he told that coach?

And VaTerp, the rules regarding this situation have been stated several times and are clear. You are choosing to handle a situation where you tell the coach the player has blood and must be taken care of in a way which is not supported by the rules.

That's the whole problem. In the OP, I say the player should not have been directed to leave.