First, A Correction: Last week I reported Crismon defeated Remington Heights by 1 point and Marc McDowell nearly pulled out the victory on his ownself. The Remington Height boys have informed me I was mistaken!! With a few seconds remaining in the game (I'll come back to this point momentarily), Marc made the 1st of 2 Free Throws. Then bricked the 2nd. Crismon rebounded but was not able to hit a desperation shot to pick up the win. So Remington Heights won, not Crismon as reported, and apparently Marc did win the game almost on his ownself!
Now as to the “ few seconds remaining" – we do not have an operational scoreboard or clock as of yet. It is rumored Church Facilities has approved replacing the controller but it has not arrived as yet. Perhaps before the tournament we will get it. Perhaps not… In the meanwhile, I'm using the clock on the wall in the Cultural Hall to keep track of game times. Obviously not the most accurate mechanism to note seconds remaining. So the end of the game is pretty much a subjective thing for me to determine. If it's a close game and the losing team has a chance to score a go ahead Buck, "a few seconds" might take 30 seconds to play so both teams get a chance to win the game. If someone has the ball that has been cranky or complained about officiating calls, "a few seconds" might mean 2 seconds and the fellow can't quite get a shot off before the "buzzer" rings to end the game. It's not fair, I know, but I like it!
Just an observation: A great place to watch football or basketball games is from the End Zone area. You see the space between players and plays & offense developing that you can't detect from the normal sideline bleachers. The stage could be a good place to watch our Stake games if we actually had someone running offense on plays.
6:00 PM Ironwood Crossing vs Nauvoo Station: Nauvoo Station was a "no-show". Apparently having Stake Conference last Sunday instead of regular church messed them up and no one bothered to announce the game to the team. Guess TEXT MESSAGING doesn't work on their phones??!! I knew my son, Tyler would not be playing. Last week he had a spot of cancer removed off his neck. Only took that US ARMY Medical Corps 4 years to decide the quarter sized red splotch was cancerous. He now has an ugly 4" scar behind his ear and instructions not to exercise vigorously for a couple weeks. Playing Stake Men's Basketball somehow was deemed to vigorous endeavor. If his doctor had seen the pace at which we play in our league he might not have minded Tyler playing.
SO… Ironwood Crossing decided to play against themselves. Only problem was they had just seven players. So I suggested Janae Nevitt, Ole's recent bride play. (You'll remember Ole's exploits – not from basketball as there weren't any, but from softball. He's the fellow that hits em’ as high as he does far and usually out of the park) He said OK. When asked if he wanted to guard her, as she was on the opposing team, he said "NO!" because she was a better basketball player than he was. Ole was right.
6:40 PM Cortina 1st VS Cortina 3rd: Must have been mutual night for the Cortina 1st Ward. Only one of their team showed up and he was 10 minutes late!
So we played another "pick up" game and the fellows decided to call their own fouls. I saw a lot of fouls in the game but not many were called. Some of the interaction could have resulted in a mugging police report but nothing was called.
7:20 PM Ironwood VS Ranch: Neither team had a full slate of players but there were several still hanging around from the 6:00 and 6:40 PM games, so we had another "pick up" game. Not wanting to risk getting kicked or elbowed while throwing the ball up in the center circle to start the game. I elected to have each team pick a number between 1 & 10. One team picked 4 and the other was 7. My number was 11. Since 7 was closest to 11 that team got the ball and the game was on!! (I never said the number I was thinking was between 1 and 10. I just said for them to pick a number between 1 and 10).
Not much remarkable happened in this game, though I did notice Nate Schlink had been working on his jumpshot and now manages to get the ball to the rim on a consistent basis. A considerable improvement from his "Air Ball" launches his last season!
I do miss Ladd Smith, he for whom the shoes which color always matched his shirt, who is not playing this year due to health considerations. We hope he gets well soon. No other players have his sense of style!
8:00 PM Cambria VS Vineyard: Vineyard has evidently repented of its slothful ways last season of being No Shows and actually had five players for game time. Way to go!! Cambria had a full team so we actually had Ward versus Ward game. I made some other notes about the game but can't read my handwriting, so I can't report any further on this game except to say I wrote something about someone having good form on their shots but that form did not always translate into made shots.
8:40 PM Remington Heights VS Desert Mountain: Shortly after the game started a few players saw me jotting down notes and asked if I was keeping score. Nope. If you want a score kept or want to know how many points you scored rustle up your own scorekeepers……
I know other teams try to defend against Marc McDowell, but he is so smooth on a drive to the basket it's as if the Defense parts like the Red Sea before Moses as he glides in for a layup. To his credit, he hasn't thrown down any dunk shots to embarrass anyone. Of course, being 7' tall does make a difference……
image via
Remington Heights had to recruit a 17 year old to have five players. I said OK. They pulled that same gambit last year in the tournament, except the "17 year old" was that Farabee kid who now plays on the Highland High School Varsity basketball team. NO, the Farabee kid can NOT play for Remington Heights during the tournament this year! Regular-season I don't care since these games don't count.
I noticed a recent convert playing on the Desert Mountain team. I remembered him from State Conference 6 months ago also sporting cowboy boots, pressed jeans and a colorful but pressed cowboy shirt. His fiancé said he felt a bit conspicuous with everyone else wearing white shirts and ties. NONSENSE. I told him to look up cowboy Joseph Kimball from my Cortina 2nd Ward. Cowboy is his Standard outfit at church and looks sharp in it! (Well, as sharp as Joseph can look considering…...)
I was reminded of a Stake I lived in previously when the good intentioned Stake President introduced a strict policy that EVERY MALE was to wear white shirts to all church Sunday and Conference meetings. I remember looking around seeing several brethren wearing colored shirts that were probably pressed with the razor sharp creases, which had just been declared unacceptable. I also saw several fellows wearing compliant white shirts that were so wrinkled you couldn't tell if they've just been hauled out of the clean clothes basket but not ironed or dug out of the dirty clothes basket from last Sunday…… Which of those fellows appeared most reverent and respectful of that meeting, the gents in the sharp pressed colored shirts or those in the crumpled up white shirts? My vote was for the pressed colored shirts!! The same with anyone wearing cowboy wear to church - pressed shirts, pressed jeans, polish boots. That's showing respect for the place and occasion and I applaud them for being true to their character.
The same hopeful Stake President & in the same meeting also banned bright "Rush Limbaugh type" ties. Only conservative ties were approved apparel. The next week, a 5th Sunday, a Stake High Councilor showed up to present a video about the church welfare system to a combined Priesthood/Relief Society meeting in our Ward. The video feature the Church President, Gordon B Hinckley, in what can only be described as a "Rush Limbaugh type" tie. My comment that President Hinckley would not be allowed to wear that time in our Stake Sunday meetings was not well received……
And all I asked our brethren is to bring a White & Dark colored shirt so they don't have to wear one of my white pull over shirts sweated in by someone else!!
9:20 PM Crismon vs Rittenhouse: I've noticed a new phenomenon the season. When I asked a team leader to call on someone to offer the pregame prayer they are pointing across at the other team and asking one of them to offer the prayer!! Happened twice this night. OK with me. If you think the other team has someone who'll be more affective and calling down the blessing of heaven on our games than someone in your own ward I'm all for it!! YOU know your teammates better than I do…
Shorts are not required when playing in our league. Full length jeans are fine, though they do limit you're leaping ability and cut down on your fast break speed a bit. Jared Wright of the Crismon Ward managed to play rather well in jeans and even managed a nifty "behind the back – no look pass delete quote. I'm not suggesting it was the jeans. Maybe it was the "no look” part of the play, but the Pass would have even better if it had been completed to teammate rather than a defender. And Brent Slade is a monster on the Offensive Boards!! Of course he'd had lots of practice going after his own missed shots. But the "follow your shots" quote is a valid coach's promise to practice!
This was a real "Run & Gun "game. Unfortunately, most of the shots fired off or blanks……
Comments on Rules & Foul Philosophy:
Contact – The incident of CONTACT does not necessarily mean a foul has occurred. A number of considerations need to be contemplated in deciding if a foul is to be (for those honest enough to call a foul!)
Did contact cause the player to lose control of the ball, miss the shot or throw an errant pass?
Did contact put either play at an unfair advantage?
Severity of the contact. A love tap or a WWW forearm smash?
Did the offense of player initiate the contact by jumping into the defender, dropping a shoulder like Full Back Off Tackle run or using his arm to hold back the defender?
A player may be bummed but if the Referee doesn't think the bump affected the play there is no foul called.
Sometimes you'll see an Offensive player – especially on last second shots – jump up and contort their body to deliberately make contact with the Defender hoping the Referee will call a foul and send the shooter to the foul line. Not in my games. When the shooter does that 2 things occur:
The shooter looks ridiculous. Take the shot!!
The shooter will likely miss the off-balance, failed to win the game from a made basket & won't get the chance to win in a bogus awarded free-throw!
The hand is part of the ball – if the player's hand is slapped while while that hand is on the ball, unless it's a particularly hard slap, it's not a foul.
Reaching In – Reaching is NOT a foul. Try looking it up in the rule book. It ain't there no matter how many times Al McCoy, the Phoenix Suns announcer says, "There is a Reaching In Foul!" How you gonna steal the ball and less you reach in!
Hacking the other players arm (not hand on the ball) or holding IS a foul. Reaching in is playing defense.
On a shot – if the defender hits the ball FIRST and then the hand, we have a blocked shot. The subsequent slap of the hand did not interfere with the shot. It was already blocked before the slap.
3 Point Shot Attempt Foul – often times a defender will use his ample backside to bang against the shooter, supposedly "Blocking Out" the shooter on a 3 point attempt and bounce the shooter backwards. Everyone wants the shooter to be awarded Free Throws. NOPE. Almost always, the shooter has returned to the floor by the time the blocking out bump occurs. Once the shooter is back on the floor the shot attempt is over any foul is a Common Foul and shots are taken only if the offense of team is in the Bonus situation.
Driving between defenders & out of bounds lines – players usually have never heard this. Few coaches either. But it is the rule! If an Offensive player WITH THE BALL attempts to drive between two defenders OR a defender and out of bounds line AND THERE IS LESS THEN 3' OF SPACE BETWEEN THE DEFENDER OR THE OUT OF BOUND'S LINE, the responsibility for contact is on the dribbler. Now if a defender sticks a knee or elbow out or pushes the dribbler we have a foul. Otherwise it's the dribblers problem if he bangs into a defender and falls down. On the sideline a coach will yell, "he got forced out!! "Yep, that's exactly what happened. The dribbler got into a spot he wasn't supposed to be. The defender cut off the Out of Bounds line access area and the dribbler went Out of Bounds. Great defense!!
Hopefully this clarification will help when you're calling your own fouls OR Refereeing a game. I hope!!
Lost & Found: that AZ Diamondbacks pull over I reported being left behind last week has not been claimed. If no one claims it this week (you need to tell me the color) I'm sending it to DI.
Banned Team Colors – all previously banned team colors are reinstated except ASU. I asked Brother Padilla from one of the Cortina Wards why he hasn't been out to play B-ball since I lifted the ban along time ago on wearing Texas puke orange colors. He said he wasn't a very good basketball player and did not want to embarrass himself. I told him that concern wasn't stopping any of the other Brethren from coming out to play & shouldn't be stopping him either.
QCNS Men's Basketball Report
3/07/2012
