Tough Calls Series: Traveling - Sample Chapter

From Referee and the National ASSociation of Sports OfficialS

Table of

Contents INTRODUCTION

6

TRavel GURUS

8

tHE cHALLENGE

11

gETTING IT RIGHT Status of the Ball The Rules Pivot Foot The Mechanics Position Angles Post Play Perimeter Play Educated Instinct Judgment Practice Physical Conditioning Mental Conditioning Repetition

15 16 18 20 24 26 27 27 31 33 35 37 38 38 39

Identifying the violation Forced Mistakes The Defensive Advantage The Ball and the Feet Common Violations Not Your Average Travel When in Doubt

41 42 43 44 46 63 69

Bonus Material The NBA Rule The Traveling Checklist

71 72 74

The

Challenge

The Challenge

he year is 1891. James Naismith has been presented with the challenge to come up with a physical activity to keep the “untalented” students in a class at the YMCA occupied. He wants to challenge the students but selfishly wants to create a game that will keep his football players in shape during the offseason.

Two peach baskets, one soccer ball and 13 rules later, basketball was born.

So what was the travel rule then? Rule #3 — “A player may not run with the ball. The player must throw it from the spot on which he catches it. Allowance to be made for a man who catches the ball when running at a good speed if he tried to stop. Except the man may run with the ball if he dribbles it.”

Can you imagine the amount of arguing coaches would do with officials if that were still the rule today? Every official would have a different interpretation of “if he tried to stop.”

It’s important to understand why officials struggle to get the play right before diving into how to get the play right.

Today the rules related to traveling are laid out into five different articles and countless caseplays in an attempt at clarity.

Yet officials have collectively pegged traveling to be one of the toughest calls in basketball. Why is that? Overanalysis? Poor training? Poor coaching of the participants of the game? A lack of understanding of the travel rule? The answer: All of the above.

Camps and clinics offer great forums for educating officials but it’s easy to take several ideas and various tips/tricks you learn at camp and let them cloud your mind. It’s important that you utilize what you learn there but have the ability to continue officiating at the same time!

Violet Palmer, coordinator of women’s basketball officials for the Western Athletic conference and the Pac-12, says, “This is what I’ve learned, and it really came to fruition for me once

T

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the Challenge

I came back to the college level and started as a coordinator.

What I noticed was that my referees used all these different terms, and I’d go, ‘What does that mean’? They really couldn’t explain it to me because what has happened is somebody said something and then everybody just starts repeating it.”

“That’s why you are missing the plays because you put all that stuff in your head. You don’t referee like that. You have all this stuff in your head that you’ve learned, that somebody told you, that you thought was going to help you get the play right, when in reality it’s really screwed you up because you’re not trusting your natural instincts of where your eyes should be,” says Palmer.

The game is changing. Players are faster and make their moves quicker, which in turn is making it more challenging than ever for officials to pick up the pivot foot.

“Many officials simply don’t know, or understand, the rule,” says Ernie Yarbrough, associate director of the Georgia High School Association. “Additionally, the speed of play often causes officials to fail to identify the primary element in determining if a traveling violation occurs, the pivot foot.

When that occurs, officials often misapply an advantage/ disadvantage perception to the action, which is incorrect regardless of how the call was or wasn’t made.”

You have several decisions to make on a given night. Since the basketball is moving from player to player by their hands, often times the last place you look is at the player’s feet.

Additionally, there are thousands of opportunities for players to travel during the game. That creates more probability to miss the call than say a block/charge situation, which may only happen a couple times, if at all, during a game.

Daniel Shepardson, rules interpreter for IAABO Board 105, Vermont says, “When you think about somebody catching a pass and therefore establishing a pivot foot, they can potentially

Tough Calls: Traveling | 13

The Challenge

travel there. When they’re making a pass, catching a pass, starting a dribble, ending a dribble, catching a rebound and coming to the floor … there are all these different ways.

Literally there are a thousand different opportunities during the course of a game.”

The game is only going to continue to get faster. Players are going to continue to get stronger and push the envelope.

Coaches are going to push their student-athletes harder. Your judgment must be keener. It’s your job to make the adjustment to the ever-changing game while maintaining the integrity of the rules established by Naismith more than 100 years ago.

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geTTing

iT righT sTaTus of The Ball LOSS OF CONTROL (viDeo)

The rules

TRAVEL ON THE DRIVE (viDeo)

PivoT fooT

EXAGGERATED NON-PIVOT (viDeo) TRAP (viDeo) PUMP FAKE (viDeo)

The meChaniCs

PRIOR TO DRIBBLE (viDeo)

PosiTion angles PosT Play PerimeTer Play eDuCaTeD insTinCT JuDgmenT PraCTiCe PhysiCal ConDiTioning menTal ConDiTioning rePeTiTion

GETTING IT RIGHT

S

o much goes in to getting a call right. Educating yourself in the different facets of the call will help your thinking when game day arrives.

Status of the Ball

Before you can even determine whether or not a traveling violation has occurred, you must be sure that the player is in control of the ball. Both the NFHS and NCAA rules state, “A player is in control when holding a live ball.” Until a player is holding the ball, he or she cannot travel. If you take nothing else from this book, take the idea that the ball is the very first key to making a travel call or no-call.

“Knowing that a player has control of the ball by holding it is the first thing you need to recognize. Second, has the player established a pivot foot, and if so which foot?” says Yarbrough.

Ball Control

1

2

3

4

You’ll notice in the MechaniGram above that the player doesn’t gain complete control until he takes his third step.

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