Not accurate. Many basketball broadcasts will have a computer tied to the clock. The clock sends the computer the countdown for game & shot (when applicable). The computer will display what it gets. This is what is used during the game.

Regardless of whether the above system is used, a camera is dedicated to shooting the clock.

If the clock system doesn't support the setup (most major arenas should), or the technology won't work for whatever reason, the clock 'camera' is actually used on the broadcast. You can tell because it will look like a scoreboard clock.

During the last minute of a period, they will record the 'game' camera with the clock camera superimposed (not the computer generated clock). It is done exactly for this situation. So the replays with the clock in the white box should be in perfect sync (action camera & clock camera).

The NBA found that long cable lengths could actually cause a delay in their systems which resulted in the clocks and LEDs being out of sync. They make adjustments to compensate for this problem.

It's definitely possible that the clock in the arena is out of sync with the LEDs by 0.1 seconds —*I think that is likely the case here.

It's physics. The signal dissipates the longer the cable run. That's why the clocks on the backboard will be slightly a head of a clock that's overhead or those on a balcony. I haven't been in Westchester Co. Arena - where this game was played - but my guess is the camera clock was on the overhead device. If it had been on one of the backboard clocks everything would have been in sync as far as the broadcast was concerned since those hit 0.0 as the LEDs came on.

It doesn't get any closer than this...
 

If one of you embedding gurus could provide a video link to this end of game play...

NEW ROCHELLE STUNS MT VERNON BOYS BASKETBALL HD - YouTube

Already done.

You are a little late. We have long ago discussing this play.

Peace

I can tell you one thing for certain, it isn't the length of the cables. And you'd know that if you understood physics.

Cables are dramatically faster than that at any length possible in even the largest arena...unless they're using the worst cables ever made.

Let say the cables in an arena in New York were routed to Chicago and back before going to the a scoreboard. That is about 1600 miles round trip (about 3 millions meters). Typical networking cable propagation times are about 500 nanoseconds per 100 meters. If you do the math (just approximating here), it takes about 15/1000 of one second to go from New York to Chicago and back. You could even go back and forth between the two cities about 6-7 times before you get 0.1 second of delay.

Even if you don't want to to the math, just think of phone calls. If you could get 0.1 second of cable delay inside of a building (worst case of 1000m) and you were on the phone in New York, you'd have to wait over 5 minutes to hear what your friend in LA says. And then they'd have to wait 5 more minutes to hear your response. Do you recall any telephones that work that way?

For that matter, you can send a signal to the moon in under 1 second (sure it is radio, but the speeds are on the same order of magnitude).

Ref in Alberta just posted a thread with a link to this video in HD. Please have one of the mods merge it here and perhaps our video editing guys can provide a definitive answer.

It's labelled HD, but it is not. It is not any better quality than the video at the beginning of the thread. It is 360p.

Yuck. Could probably get a better picture by listening on radio.

Camron, trust me, I understand physics. I also work in television. The type of cables you're talking about aren't the same type of cables used to wire up the timing devices in an arena, especially an older building like Westchester County Arena.

I'm talking basic low-grade networking cable, costs pennies, nothing fancy. The cable just isn't going to make the difference when we're talking about a tenth of a second. There may be differences in the system that causes delays, but isn't the cables. And yes, I design high speed electronics for a living and it actually involves dealing with delays on wires.

If you can transmit and receive from a satellite in <.25 (1/4 second), and the distance is 45,000 miles to make that trip (22,500 one way), I highly doubt even 2000 feet of cable is going to "slow down" a picture.

Here's the other thing to think about... as long as the camera shooting the action and the camera shooting the clock are both "delayed" (right, that's what you're saying, that the cable distance affects speed), then they're still in sync.

They could both be delayed 10 seconds, but as long as they're in sync they're accurate.

And another thought... broadcasts (from college to pro) are used all the time to review last second shots. They use the same technology that was shown in the reply (game/shot clock superimposed over game camera). If the system is inaccurate, why use it?

I know, at least in the NBA, they aren't using superimposed clocks. Since the game clock is the first clock of importance when determining the end of the period in the NBA, they're using shots with the game clock in the view of the camera (followed by LED lights which is next on the list when determining end of period/shot clock period).

I agree that would be ideal. I have also worked games (in the broadcast truck) where the camera operator goofed and didn't include the clock in the shot. Then they go to the superimposed clock.

My point is simply they use the superimposed clock many times, why would it all of a sudden be considered "inaccurate" now? Just as a reminder, I'm not talking about the computer generated clock that is used through most of the game, but superimposing the "clock" camera over the "game" camera.

I may have posted about this before, but I was at a game a few years ago when the clock/TV thing came into play. Missouri State was playing at St. Louis University in 2006. MSU was up 50-49 and SLU had the last possession. They took a shot with a couple seconds left, followed by a tip-in at the buzzer. The officials went to the monitor and ended up counting the basket. A day or two later, it came out that the TV broadcast that they used to watch the replays was off by 3/10 of a second, so the clock on the screen showed .3 on the clock when the ball was tipped. If you watch the video of it below, you can actually pause it at a certain frame and hear the horn start to go off and the ball isn't even touching the shooter's hand yet on the tip-in.

SLU vs Missouri State Basketball - YouTube

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