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• Monday, March 20, 2006 12:21 PM

  Back Court Violation

  I agree that the current rule is pretty arbitrary. I don't know how you feel about lacrosse so I'll not try to convert you (and your readers) but lacrosse provides a similar situation that is analogous to this very conundrum.

  Once an offensive team has moved the ball into the offensive scoring area (in lacrosse this is referred to as the restraining box) and chooses to either kill time (or if that team has the lead and less than 2 minutes remain in the game) they are required to "Keep it in the box" as instructed by the officials to prevent stalling. If the offensive team inadvertantly carries the ball out of said restraining box, the possession is awarded to the defensive team (the same could apply here-if the offensive b-ball team simply carried it over the half-line the guy's an idiot and should have the ball awarded to the other team). However, if the ball is dropped or if a defender forces the ball out of the stick of the offender and the ball should leave the restraining box, a player from the offensive team may not regain possession of the ball until a defensive player touches the ball.

  So, let's say, in a basketball game, a pass is mishandled or something, and the ball is in the back court, the offensive team cannot touch the ball until it is touched by the defensive team. If the back court situation was predicated by the defensive team touching the ball, I think the same situation should apply: the offensive team could not touch the ball until a defender touched the ball. This gives neither team a free pass as one has to play defense to regain possession, risking a foul, and the other has not gotten the advantage of an inbounds situation.

  Could work, but someone would probably just call a timeout.

  —Mark
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