Free Throw Disrupted By Fan
 

This situation happened this week. Girls varsity game. Visitor is shooting the first of 2 FTs. Home fan (happens to be a varsity boys player) runs to the baseline under the hoop and starts waving his arms. Before anything can be done by our crew the girl shoots and missed badly.

We gave her a replacement shot. Explained things to home coach without objection. Game management took care of the fan.

Thoughts?

That's how I would have done it, assuming I didn't get the whistle blown earlier.

There is no rule allowing you to give a replacement free throw for this.
You should have penalized the home team with a technical foul for failure to control its spectators and allowing one of them to interfere with the game.

NevadaRef:

I agree with you. While we would all agree that the very, very, very, very last thing that an official would ever want to do to charge a team's fans with a TF, the OP is one of the rare times when an official has no choice to bite the bullet and do so.

MTD, Sr.

In hind sight I agree with all the comments. I am happy with the way it was handled but I also understand the technical foul that could have been issued. Thanks for the feedback.

This is a rare case to use 2-3 IMO...readminister the first FT.

I would recommend to not issue a technical foul. Nevada is of the mind that issuing technical fouls to the home team for spectator behavior should be used more liberally than 96.532 percent of other officialsbelieve. In Nevada's world, anyone could appear as a fan for an opponent...and do the same thing to distract...get a missed Ft...and then 2 additional FT's for his real team.

While there is no rule to support the replacement FT, I believe my assignors would rather that was how this were handled rather than giving the home team a TF.

I don't mean to say my personal feelings trump the rules, but it doesn't seem right to punish the home team like that. It's not the teams responsibility to control the crowd, so why should they be punished like that?

Especially If They're Wearing Groucho Marx Glasses ...
 

Agree. They can be anybody.

One cannot invoke 2-3 when there is already rules coverage provided to handle the situation.

That is why you work with game management to determine the identity of the individual before having the person removed or issuing any penalty.
Notice that the OP stated that this was a member of the boys varsity team from the home school.

Compromise ???
 

Good point. In this case the distracting fan was very easy to identify, other times, it may be more difficult, or even impossible.

How about Fundamental #16: The official’s whistle seldom causes the ball to become dead (it is already dead).

The officials couldn't sound their whistles in time to stop the try, so, in reality, the player may have shot a dead ball. Try again.

Sorry, but this doesn't mean we can just declare the ball has been dead because it's more convenient. There is a list of things that make the ball dead, and none of them involve a fan.

A fan committing an act which results in a team technical foul would make the ball dead, barring a try being in flight. Of course, the official would have to be stopping play to charge the technical foul!

My first question would be how certain are we the miss was because of the fan? If it was too late to stop it.....

Part Of The Game ???
 

We see fans (granted, mostly in higher levels, college, NBA; but some in high school) trying to distract free throw shooters all the time, without any repercussions. What makes this situation so special? Because the offender was a member of the opponent's other gender team?

Technical foul is a nuclear option. Rules really don't allow us to give a replacement free throw. We're stuck.

2-3, although not technically relevant, seems the most appropriate way to approach this matter.

Maybe it's one of those "sometimes we just have to officiate" situations.

Maybe we just ask the site director to keep fans away from the endline during free throws, and move on.

My guess is that the fan was on the floor rather than in the stands. I think that's a significant difference.