Think about this situation with me. I have seen this one before!
Player for A1 secures a long rebound and bolts toward his/her basket. You are the trailing/covering official and you advance quickly up/down the floor. While you are advancing near Team B's bench, the coach/bench personnel loudly advises you that you are an idiot, dropping the "F" bomb to emphasize his point. You clearly hear this remark, and well-as much as you hate to do it you're going to have to "T" this one up. Question: When do you blow and assess the technical foul?
The question is a good one, and it asks us to think about something that comes up over and over again in so many ways. There is an answer about the play part. And, it is addressed in the NFHS 2012-2013 Casebook on pages 88 and 89. It falls under "WITHHOLD WHISTLE: 10.4.1 SITUATION F".
A couple of thoughts come to my mind; first-I have not had to spell "withhold" in a long time, I forgot there was the double h (it just looked weird.) Second, how many times in the rulebook or casebook are we asked to withhold a whistle anyway? It cannot be that many. Back to the point.
In the casebook when you read it you will see clear reference to the fact that A1 is advancing the ball toward the basket on an apparent goal. Said another way (for my friends from my home state of WV), the guy/gal is trying to score. The book advises us to hold our whistles and allow the play to develop to a made or missed basket-then blow the technical foul. And in my example, that is if the offensive language is coming from Team B. You react differently if the insult comes from Team A's bench/coach!
I will let you read the casebook for yourself and go over that. What I want you to think about here is that once again we are invited/advised to know clearly what is going on with the ball. We have to have court awareness enough and maturity enough in that situation to not stop that scoring attempt until it plays out.
In the situation I saw; the official banged the play too early. The result was he went to the table to assess the technical foul AND wipe off a basket. I gave him the information that the ball went in the basket. He chose to not award the goal.
In a case like this example, where I made the offensive language targeted at the official, it sometimes hard for us to not react very quickly. We have emotions on the floor as well. In the "on floor" culture now with so many coaches "working" the officials night in and night out, we can get on edge. Especially late in the season. We have to stay focused on the issue/s at hand, and on what we are on the floor to do.
One of the assignors I work for has a piece of advice he sends out several times a season. It is an exhortation that each crew work each night "to be the best team on the floor." Not only knowing the rules and getting calls right, but making sure we stay level headed and even keel on the floor is very important.
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