I am going to the opposing coach and letting him know he is running late
As soon as he gets here we will get started. Just don't envision giving a T here.

Me either.

If only most knew how hard it is sometimes for school systems to fill some of these lower level (frosh, middle school) coaching positions with capable, quality individuals. Most have to come from outside school system as teachers no longer want to coach, but hold on to their teaching positions. These guys (and ladies) may have time consuming jobs or businesses that are their main concern and livelihood. In addition, most of these lower level games are in afternoon, sometimes as early as 4pm, when conflicts with a real job can occur. Hearing a coach at this level is running late is certainly plausible to me and deserves the benefit of the doubt and a little slack.

And the same would apply to officials in these situations.

Tis true...but, if you are an official assigned to a game and you see, for instance, next Tuesday looming as a possible conflict, you probably come off that assignment to avoid any cluster___. A lone coach (some don't have assistants) might not have this luxury.

An official can have something come up at the last minute at his 9-to-5. One of my assignor's has a great deal of trouble filling in those 4:00 start times. Someone could say they are taking off from work at 3:00 and then get that unexpected phone call or meeting that holds them up.

Very observant of you. That is exactly what I said...and meant.

As for what I'd do, I'd probably be accommodating of a team in such a situation. I've started games late because the visiting team got lost or stuck in traffic...and we just started late with no T's. We set the pregame clock to 15-20 when they walked in the door and went from there.

Me, too -- and what I meant with my clock running example. The "exception" would be if someone started the clock without knowing that the coach would be late, or if the clock was started because "the coach was in the parking lot" (and the names didn't get in on time), etc.

Me three.

MTD, Sr.

Whether to penalize or not is not the issue that I have with your post. It is your reasoning. You essentially write don't penalize the kids because of the coach. I don't agree with that and am pointing out that they are all part of the team.
Now whether you actually penalize is a different story, but the rationale shouldn't be what you stated.

I have seen a similar situation at the V level in the past two years - one time the bus ran into a serious accident that was holding up traffic, the other was because of road construction.

I would have hard time explaining to any authorities (AD, assignor, etc.) that we started giving out technicals because of these situations. This is still high school basketball and we have to use some prudent judgement in these situations.

Now with that said, your situation is a little different and possibly could have been avoided, but I am always a little miffed when some officials forget about having compassion for the circumstances. Its one of the reasons for my signature quote.

I too think a bus crash or unexpected circumstances is warranted for some leniency. I'll be honest, I don't know why the coach was late, maybe I should have asked why before making a ruling. The opposing coach vocalized his concern about getting the underclassmen to another game across town. I felt like this was a fair decision, to charge a team tech for the book so that hopefully in the future this situation will be avoided. It didn't seem like an excessively harsh penalty and I am glad we also did not charge a second tech for not being ready to play. I feel like that was a good decision.

That might be his concern, but then he shouldn't have scheduled the games so close together. And, how does starting the game with a T make it end any sooner? If he's so concerned he can talk to the other coach and agree to shorten the game.

Your concern is only the current game.

I'd probably do the same, especially for a Freshman level game.

This