Cliff notes on fighting, penalties
 

Looking ahead to playoffs next week and thought I'd put together a short list of situations for fights and the consequences.

Anyone have a pregame primer on this?

PLAYERS ON THE COURT
If an EQUAL number of players from both teams participate in the fight .. ALL are charged with flagrant technical fouls and disqualified. No free throws are awarded and the ball is in-bounded at the point of interruption.

If there is an UNEQUAL number of players who participate in the fight... ALL are charged with flagrant technical fouls and disqualified. The offended team (team with fewer players) will be awarded two free throws for EACH additional player.
Keep in mind, taunting may be viewed as the “first punch." If the provoked player physically retaliates, both players are charged with flagrant technical fouls and are disqualified.

PLAYERS ON THE BENCH
Simply stated, if a player leaves the bench area and comes onto the court during a skirmish, they are charged with a flagrant technical foul and disqualified. Penalties for bench personnel stepping onto the court will also impact the head coach.

For those reserves who ENTER the court, but DO NOT participate in the fight... The head coach is charged with a MAXIMUM of ONE indirect technical foul, no matter how many bench players come onto the floor.

If there is an EQUAL number of non-fighting bench personnel on the court ... Those players are disqualified. No free throws are awarded for their actions.

If there is an UNEQUAL number of players who leave the bench area and DO NOT fight... Those players are disqualified. The offended team would be awarded a MAXIMUM of two free throws for this segment of the scenario.

For BENCH PERSONNEL who DO PARTICIPATE in the fight... The heads coach is assessed an INDIRECT TECHNICAL foul for EACH bench person who participates. Remember, three indirect technical fouls would result in the head coach being disqualified.

If there is an EQUAL number of bench personnel fighting on the court... No free throws are awarded for their actions and play would resume at the point of interruption.

If there is an UNEQUAL number of players who leave the bench area and participate in the fight, the offended team... Would be awarded two free throws for EACH additional player involved. Would receive the ball at the division line for a throw-in.

For liability purposes, disqualified players are permitted to remain on the bench and should not to be ordered to leave the court area without proper adult supervision.
Rule References

NFHS 4-18; 10-4; 10-6

Excellent BZ..... going to marry this with preventive measures.

Best tools we have are our ears. Seldom does anything escalate to this level without in-game chatter and trash talk as a lead in.

HaHa I go to my documents and there it is already!! And from just a few months ago!

I've loaded mine onto Dropbox (similar to Google Docs...on the cloud) so they can be accesed by phone or tablet anywhere. Pretty darn handy when pre-game questions pop up.

No question, along those lines best advice from a camp, a D1 observer told us to identify the troublemaker, he'll #$@& up your game, Don't make up calls but watch him.

Behind the times, haven't quite grasped dropbox yet....afraid of things going poof.

Never had an issue in the two years I've been using it. Google has a similar service and they are pretty solid so I don't think that would be an issue. Cloud computing...the next wave of technology.

Dropbox has been awesome for me this year... This was the first year that I utilized it in my game. I have a shared folder with about 10 other officials that we all use to share video clips quickly and easily between each other. It's been great!

I've also used it to keep my pregame and other important docs (monitor rules, fighting rules, etc.) with me at all times on my phone or iPad!

Dropbox is your friend!

It works like any normal map, however instead of storing the data that is in the map on your harddisk, it is stored on a remote server. This means that other devices (smartphones, laptops etc..) and other people (if you give them permission) can also access the data.

It is stored on a so-called cloud network with backups (even including older versions of your document), so the risk of things going poof is virtually zero (or at least way smaller than when you store them on your own harddisk).

Inquiring Minds Still Want To Know ...
 

Still doesn't answer the time honored question: If the first punch (and maybe the only punch) is thrown during a live ball, is the foul charged as a technical flagrant foul, or a personal flagrant foul. And it does make a difference in terms of who gets to shoot the free throws, the punchee; his substitute, if the punchee is injured and must be removed from the game; or the best free throw shooter on the team, who happens to be sitting on the bench.

Identify the "star," identify the @$$hole.

Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft SkyDrive, you're a thousand times safer storing documents on any of these than on your own PC or a flash drive.

That question is easily answered.

Any contact foul during a live ball is a personal foul, never technical.

A swing/miss with be a flagrant technical foul because you can't have a personal foul without contact.

(Light bulb goes on) Ah ha......good to refresh this one.