Belmont-UNC: Block/Push/No-call (video)

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by BryanV21

I'm a high school official, so perhaps the rules are different at the collegiate level. But in the NFHS rule book, Rule 4-24 Art. 5 says "The guard must give the opponent the time and/or distance to avoid contact".

Originally Posted by APG

The rule you cite (I'm think you meant 4-23-5a.) says that guarding a moving opponent without the ball:

Time and distance is required to obtain an INITIAL legal position.

Go to 4-23-3 and it tells you what can occur after an initial legal position is obtained. You'll find absolutely nothing that says anything about time or distance. You'll even see that it says once that initial legal guarding position is obtained, that a guard may move laterally or obliquely to maintain that position...provided it is not toward the opponent when contact occurs. Time and distance is only relevant in first obtaining that initial guarding position on a moving opponent.

^^What he said!

OBTAINING requires time/distance. MAINTAINING does not. If it did, the defense might as well just step out of the way and let the offense get to the basket because that would make it impossible to play defense without committing a foul on every play.