HELP - Wrong info from scorekeeper

[kycat1]

NCAA-W

H1 serves and after many volleys, V2 spikes ball down into H's court for apparent point. Right after R1 whistles, R2 whistles and holds up hand to let R1 know that he needs to check something in the book. R2 verifies that V team was out of rotation and that point should go to H team. After this delay, H team is confused who should serve next and asks R2 for server check. R2 asks scorekeeper who is the next server for H team. Scorekeeper thinks R2 wants to know who is serving after H1 and says H2. R2 tells H team that H2 is next server so H team rotates (scorekeeper is really confused now and says nothing to R2). H2 then serves 2 more points and coach of V Team tells R2 that H2 is wrong server. R2 verifies that H1 should have been the server. What should R1 do since both the scorekeeper and R2 gave H team the wrong information?
I know what to do if H team had wrong server because of their error, but what if it is the officials error that caused the wrong server to serve?

[OmniSpiker]

Why would H rotate if they haven't lossed a rally to V yet? Am I missing something here?

[BlitzkriegBob]

Originally Posted by OmniSpiker

Why would H rotate if they haven't lossed a rally to V yet? Am I missing something here?

That's the whole point of the OP. H wasn't supposed to rotate, but they did, because they were told by R2 and SK that H2 was the proper server.

Again, I don't know NCAA rules. I know we discussed this on the NFHS board (it actually was a thread that I started last year) and Jan had excellent posts talking about how the rule book does not cover mistakes made due to an official's error. He received a clarification from someone (don't remember who) that this mistake could be corrected since it was caused by the officiating crew, but that was a Fed ruling, not NCAA.

[OmniSpiker]

I read,
R2 did not instruct H to rotate, but merely stated the next server H2. At this level, there shouldn't be this kind of confusion amongst the player and who is currently serving, who's next especially on first serving order. Yet it happened. Both Scorekeeper and R1 should've questioned R2 why rotate H forward immediately? V team was indicated as out of rotation, not determined to be a rotation/serving order ahead or behind. Scorekeeper hasn't done anything wrong, until allowing H team to be out of serving order and continuing to add score. Either team could've requested a line up check.

My understanding is that it is typically go back to last known accurate info (USAV), can't reward/penalyze team for officiating mistakes that can be corrected. It's just ugly to show on scoresheet how one team is on X rotation serving order and the other team is on totally separate Y rotation serving order.

I'll be interested in how this gets fixed...I take it was several serving order into the set/game.

I totally don't accept the USAV excuse that, "I go with whatever the scorekeeper has on record," when the scorekeeper took directions from the R1 or R2 as to who's serving when it's wrong info.

[Andy]

I'm not familiar with NCAA rules, so I will let one of the experts handle the question. As I was reading the question, something else jumped out at me.

If I am reading this right, H serves and V is "out of rotation". Wouldn't this be an illegal alignment penalty? The OP said that R2 checked after the rally was over, then called the violation on V. Is this proper procedure? If R2 missed the illegal alignment at the time of the serve, shouldn't he just eat it and be better prepared the next time?

Don't mean to hijack the thread, but I found this curious.

[OmniSpiker]

Let's try this answer...

***background: story time***

JOV 14's

I'm R1 and after three serving order, both teams made subs and have completely become disorientated. I suspected an out of rotation on now serving team. Neither coach are sure of where their players are at, receiving is now playing three middle hitters - essentially one outside hitter got subbed for a middle hitter - who then proceeded to take up middle position. Current middle is now confused and sort of takes outside hitter spot. Which was not apparent to me. So serving team jumps two serving order, of which I was not aware. I asked score keeper and R2 to verify the line up and both said that everything was okay. I'm a little confused but proceed. There was two turnovers since and now the serving team is using the same server again. Okay, it's very apparent to me now, so I asked both teams to stand at base positions for a line up check. I get blank stares from everybody - including both coaches, who then now look stupidfied. I get down, go look at the scoresheet to find out who's the proper server. What do both teams do, they decided to huddle and chat amongst themselves. Scorekeeper did not track who's serving at all, but only counted score. Obvious there's no good known information except the original line up. I get furious now and tell both coaches to get their players on the court into home base positions. We're on serve rotation five. I step onto court manually put each person into correct line up, by asking which position they are suppose to play. Now that's where the three middle hitters come in and coach admit to submitting the wrong line up and tried to sub to fix the line up, only to ended up messing it up more. The other team, well merely got shuffled themselves after substitution and forgotten their line up order becuase they normally started with the setter in front but this time started with their setter in the back. Well I wasted eight minutes on that and really had to laughed at both teams - of which were said to be high caliber, high costs teams.

Anyway, I didn't not penalize either team on score...just had them play it out from that point on. I don't know if they were testing me, but I had to do two more line up checks to finish off the first set...The second and third sets went smoothly.

I thought I didn't know what I was doing and we really do take the "let them play" philosophy to extent, but I got a few applaude from some parents and I got quite a few more ugly faces made at me. Personally if the participants don't understand the W or W+ pattern or home base positions, they need to sign up for community volleyball instead of traveling volleyball. Likewise I'm not proficient at scorekeeping, but I can handle score flipping just fine and at least would know which serving rotation we're at. Good scorekeepers are rare commodity on officiating teams.

***

So maybe "let them play" till V team gets to serve and then serves. At which point the score becomes solidified, and then all the line up check and correct placement of players can be verified. It's a poor excuse to fix several compounded mistakes, and would be the last resort to officially seal it. If there's gonna be a delay, make the delay as short as possible to minimize upsetting everyone. Of course not everyone one would be happy with this decision, but owning up to mistakes takes a lot of humility.

[MCBear]

kycat1, in your situation, since the error was cause by both the scorekeeper and the R2, I would remove the two points scored by H2, correct the line-up for H with H1 in right back and allow H1 to resume serving with the score at 1-0. Although the team is ultimately responsible for knowing who the correct server is supposed to be, since they were put in an incorrect position after asking for a line-up check, we are going to correct the officials' error and treat it as though the error never happened. We are not going to penalize anyone for our dumb-dumb mistake. When this type of situation has occurred during matches, I have gotten in the habit of physically using the scoresheet to put the players in the correct positions.