A few weeks ago, all registered high school basketball officials in Minnesota received a packet in the mail that included the new Rule Books. Most of the rules stay the same year to year, but there are some tweaks, usually in the areas of legal jerseys, headbands and other “fashion” items we are expected to police. The rules that govern high school basketball in this country (and youth basketball) follow the rules established by the National Federation of High School Associations.

Of the two 2009-10 “Rule Books” in my packet, one has a purple cover, and the other is green. Can you guess which color is the boys’ Rule Book and which one is the girls Rule Book? Green? Purple? Give up?

Trick question. There is only one Rule Book (technically called a “Rules Book”) - and it boasts a purple cover by the way. The other Rule Book I was referring to (with the green cover) is this year’s Case Book.

What’s the difference? The Rule Book is just that, a specific list of rules on 72 pages that no one outside the NFHS editor can truly grasp every nuance. It’s boring, mundane reading that most parents, many coaches and too high of a percentage of youth basketball officials never have and never will read. The Case Book is way more interesting because it is filled with specific situations, such as “traveling or not” and the rule the justifies the example.

When I wrote BasketCases, my publisher sought and received permission from the NFHS to use specific examples from the current rule book and case book at the time (2007) to verify and document key rules and how officials apply them. Section IV of my book is entitled “Six Rules Every BasketCase Must Understand and Memorize.” It was important that I devoted a small section to six key rules – traveling, “over the back,” illegral dribble, over-and-back, block/charge and three seconds in the lane — which are routinely misunderstood. For example, the reason “over the back” has quote marks around it is because there is no such rule even though moms, dads and coaches in gyms in every city in this country scream for it and plenty of officials erroneously use the wrong terminology to call a foul. For each of those rules mentioned above, I divide the chapter in four sections: What the Rule Book says, What the Case Book says, The Whistleblower Reality and What BasketCases Need to Know.

If every youth basketball parent, coach and official read just those 20 pages, the drug companies would have far less consumers in need of their high blood pressure medicine. It could serve as a catalyst for health care reform.

Let me share a recent encounter with a youth basketball coach during a fall league game. Near the end of the first half, a player made an “up-and-under” move and scored a basket. The opposing coach thought it was a traveling violation. I didn’t think so and neither did my partner. That coach and I had a lengthy discussion at halftime about the play.

He claimed that the opposing player took two steps. I explained that it doesn’t matter how many steps he took. What matters is: Did the player’s pivot foot return to the floor before a shot or a pass? I tried to explain that a player can lift his or her pivot foot as long as that player shoots or passes the ball before returning it to the floor. (This is mentioned in Chapter 15: “Travelng” on page 68 of BasketCases, along with the specific rule I am referring to: 4-44-3a).

The coach didn’t want to — or choose not to – listen to my explanation. I told him that Janel McCarville became an All-American at the University of Minnesota on that move, which riled him up something fierce. He argued that this wasn’t girls’ basketball, my example proved his point and I was dead wrong, and loudly told me to ask my partner or anyone in the gym that there is a separate rule book for girls basketball (which must have gotten lost in the mail for 12 consecutive years). I should have used Kevin McHale as an example instead! As I mentioned already, there is only one rule book for high school basketball. In college, there are different rule books for men’s and women’s basketball, but that vast majority of those rules are the same, with a few noteworthy exceptions (e.g., no 10-second count in the backcourt for college women, 30-second shot clock (35 for men), etc.). The traveling rule the coach was complaining about is the same in high school and college.

I love it when a coach who obviously has never opened a rule book claims there are two rule books! Just part of the ongoing fun basketball officials deal with every weekend. By the way, Rule 1, Section 12, Articles D and E specify the different sizes and weight for high school boys and girls competition, the only difference between girls and boys basketball that I am aware of. And if you really want to know, Article C states that the ball..shall have a deeply pebbled cover with horizontally shaped panels bonded tightly to a rubber carcass.

Good stuff. Trust me, BasketCases is way more entertaining and enlightening. Someone get this coach a copy for Christmas.  

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 5th, 2009 at 1:25 am and is filed under Officiating. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.