Buzzer beater...........oops

[just another ref]

Things got a bit hectic at the end tonight. BV, close game all night. V leads by 3 under a minute. H on offense, shot, miss, rebound, another miss, ball tapped out and V33 winds up with a breakaway. H15 sprinted after and got there just in time to leap and grab a shoulder and take V33 to the floor. I made the X. H head coach was up and screaming, but I quickly realized he was screaming at H15: "HELP HIM UP!" Good. Nobody was unhappy with this call. V33 can ice it. 16 seconds left. He clanks both. Ball on the endline. V inbounds. I expect an immediate foul, but there is none. They swing it all around the perimeter, then V35 flashes open in the paint. Ball goes to him, he turns to lay it up and misses, rebounds, misses again. (pass it back out, son) H finally secures the rebound. I expect a timeout, there is none. I'm new lead so now I bust it to get ahead of the play. H23 puts it on the floor and starts hard upcourt. I glance at the clock and see 2 seconds, thinking he's not gonna get it off. I heard the words time out, I think, but not from anybody I was dealing with at the time. I then hear a whistle, glance back at my partner who is indicating TO for H, then H23 releases a shot 12-15 feet in the backcourt, which banks in as the buzzer sounds. HC is screaming again, I heard the words timeout. I thought he was saying that he requested timeout and wanted to be sure he was going to have time put back. No, he was saying he didn't ask for timeout at all. Partner said he had granted the timeout to a player. Said multiple players were saying timeout and one had actually come toward him making the T signal. Naturally all the kids denied making the request. Coach asked what number. Partner didn't know. Oops.
Coach suggested it couldn't be a timeout if we didn't know what number. I politely told him that was not the case, that the whistle undeniably caused the ball to be dead. Apparently he had no argument that the whistle came before the release. He suggested that since there was no timeout request that it was an inadvertant whistle. My splainer was about gone for the evening by now so I didn't bother to tell him that even if there was no request and it was an inadvertant whistle, it still made the ball dead. Partner said he had the request at 2 seconds (clock had no tenths) so we put the time back on the clock and H inbounded at the 28' line in the backcourt. Inbounds pass was deflected and trickled out of bounds at the buzzer. Coach said there was no request, he had video, and we would be "reported."
I said okay.