NFHS - Volleyball Out-of-bounds rule

[karlchilders]

My first post.

I've had a lot of fun watching my daughter play volleyball over the last 4 years. She's a freshman now and I've been scoring lots of sets over these last 4 years.

It seems that the out-of-bounds call causes way too much confusion. Even the officials don't give me the same answer when it comes to "at what point is a ball out of bounds?"

I'm only speaking to this one instance:

b. Touches the floor completely outside the court's boundary lines, with no part of the ball in contact with the boundary line(s).

Here's where I am on this.

1. How many parts are there to a ball?
"...with no part of the ball in contact with the boundary line(s)."

2. What does completely outside the boundary lines mean?
My thought here is that if the ball were laying on the floor, and I were looking down from above, the edge of the ball would not cover any part of the boundary line.

But, if that's correct, why the need to further say "with no part of the ball in contact with the boundary lines". Because it would be impossible for the ball to be in contact with the boundary lines if it were that far away.

So now I'm thinking that "completely outside the boundary lines" means that although the ball isn't touching the lines, if I were looking down on the ball, the edge of the ball may still be covering the boundary line.

3. And finally, why not just use the center of the ball as to whether it's in or out. A ball is a sphere. The court is a plane. A sphere only touches a plane at one point. Right in the center. So if the center of the ball touches outside the line, it's out. If it's touching the line, it's in.

I've had officials say, "yeah, but the ball flattens out when it hits the floor." Sure it does, but that's after the center of the ball contacts the floor first. At which point it's either in or out. I mean, if the center of the ball hits outside the line (and therefore it's out of bounds) but then flattens enough so that the ball contacts the boundary line, it doesn't change from out-of-bounds to in-bounds does it?

And who's good enough to know just how much a ball flattens when it hits?

I'm looking forward to here what those smarter that me have to say.

Thank you for your time.