Don't Celebrate Too Soon

[Benny B]

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/02/burrillville-high-school-basketball-team-celebrates-state-title-before-losing-on-last-second-shot

The saddest thing about this story isn't the team who thought they won, it's the fact that the RI State Tournament is played in Ballroom C at the Hyatt Regency.

[rocket surgeon]

dude thought he heard the fat lady singing heyn'a

[mu_hilltopper]

Why did the ref add more time on the clock?  The guy threw the ball up, backwards, someone caught it and dribbled.   Maybe the video isn't clear?

[StillAWarrior]

Why did the ref add more time on the clock?  The guy threw the ball up, backwards, someone caught it and dribbled.   Maybe the video isn't clear?

The kid who caught the ball called an immediate time-out.

Edited to add:  It was a very generous call by the referee.  You can see the clock in the background when he catches the ball.  His first contact -- at the top of his jump -- was when the clock was at 0.9 seconds.    He's hitting the floor and looking at the Ref at about 0.4-0.5.  So, it was generous to give them 1.0 on the clock.  That said, the final bucket was the type that often would get allowed in that short of a time frame.

[mu_hilltopper]

Wow .. really. How do you even do that while dribbling ..

[StillAWarrior]

Wow .. really. How do you even do that while dribbling ..

I think he called the time-out before he dribbled - as soon as his feet were hitting the floor.

[mu_hilltopper]

Certainly possible.   

One would think the first impulse for a player who knows the buzzer is just about to go is .. not to call time out, but to put up a shot, however crappy.

Astounded he'd call TO, and equally shocked the ref would give it to him.

[keefe]

Certainly possible.   

One would think the first impulse for a player who knows the buzzer is just about to go is .. not to call time out, but to put up a shot, however crappy.

Astounded he'd call TO, and equally shocked the ref would give it to him.

Burned into the collective memory of the Maize and Blue Faithful...

[Benny B]

It looked like he caught the ball at 0.8-0.9 and his feet hit around 0.4-0.5.  Assuming, of course, he called timeout as he hit the floor, there would have been at least 0.4 on the clock had they gone to replay (which apparently, they don't have).  By definition (under NCAA rules, of course), 0.4 is enough for a catch and shoot but they converted the final basket with a touch shot, so 1.0 or 0.4, the shot would have got off on time.

In that situation, with a borderline call between timeout and game over, TO is the correct call.  It's not a foul call under the rim with under 2.0 to play, i.e. the ref's call isn't likely to decide the game.  In this case, they have to inbound from half court and get a touch-shot off... though of course they converted, it's still a very low probability that the TO call changes the outcome of the game as opposed to game over which does decide the game.  In other words, if there was a half tick left and the refs ended it, it would have been more unfair to the team who lost because they didn't get one last chance than it would have been to the team who lost because the other team did get one more chance with extremely long odds.