Tough Calls in Elk River-Lakeville North Game
The officiating crew earned its meager pay Thursday night at Williams Arena as Elk River edged Lakeville North 57-56 for the opportunity to play for a state championship Saturday night. It was as great a game as you would think…
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Continue ReadingThe officiating crew earned its meager pay Thursday night at Williams Arena as Elk River edged Lakeville North 57-56 for the opportunity to play for a state championship Saturday night. It was as great a game as you would think a one-point state semi-final would be. It had everything, including incredible, gutsy performances from players on both sides of the ball—Gabi Haack, Sidney Wentland, Ava Kramer, Kelsie Cox, Temi Carda, Caitlyn Peterson, Taylor Brown and several more. But, there were 3 tough calls down the stretch that had people talking.
1:12
The MSHSL official play-by-play has the innocuous line in it: “1:12 Timeout 30 sec.” But what happened at 1:12 was a much more complicated scenario.
Gabi Haack drove into the lane for Elk River and was upended around the FT line in what looked like a shooting foul. The officials conversed about the foul for quite awhile, and then one of them approached the scorer’s table and held up two fingers followed by 3 fingers. That would be #23 Caitlyn Peterson, and it would be her 4th foul. But, at the very instant that the official was holding up said fingers, a replay on the Jumbotron up above him clearly showed Temi Carda, #4, colliding with Haack. It was not a reviewable situation. But not only did it appear to be a two-shot foul, but Lakeville North already had 10 fouls any way.
Haack said after the game that she asked coach Jeremy Digiovanni, “I’m shooting free throws, right?” Well, no. It turns out that coach had called a timeout a second before Haack drew the foul. So, no, she’s not shooting FT. But, the officials spent a good 60 seconds discussing who to charge with the foul on Haack and then went over to the scorers table to assess the foul on Peterson. And, only after all of that was the play waved off and the timeout called.
So we on press row were all totally confused as to why Haack wasn’t shooting FT. The timeout came after the foul, right? Wrong. Instead, Elk took the ball from out of bounds and Ava Kramer promptly drove to the rim for what turned out, 56 seconds later, to be the winning basket.
Meanwhile, Peterson fouled out less than a minute later but we checked and the phantom foul against Haack described here was not one of her 5 fouls. It was waved off in that respect, too.
0:03.8
Kari Macura missed a driving layup for Lakeville North but Lauren Jensen grabbed the offensive rebound. She quickly put up a shot, a jumper from the right elbow. On the slow-mo replay on the Jumbotron, you can see the official on the baseline wave off the shot and point to the Panthers bench just as the shot reached its apex. Also, from the right side of the screen, a second official enters the screen pointing to the Lakeville bench. Sure enough, the shot drops down from its peak and drops right through the basket. But, it does not count.
A Lakeville fan said after the game, “How could they spend all that time reviewing the play and then get it wrong?” The ball, he meant, had left Jensen’s hand before the timeout was called (and, clearly, it had). Therefore, it should count, right? Wrong. If the final buzzer had sounded with the ball in the air, it would count. But a timeout kicks in instantly, according to the Supervisor of Officials for the tournament, nullifying Jensen’s shot even though it had left her hand before the timeout call. It was a dead ball even though it was up in the air. Lakeville coach Shelly Clemons did not argue or criticize that call.
0:03
But she was critical of a no-call on the ensuing in-bounds. The Panthers got the ball to Temi Carda in the left corner and she quickly got up for a 3-point jumper. Elk River’s Kelsie Cox came roaring down the baseline, went up high and cleanly blocked the ball out of the air after it had left Carda’s hand. No foul up top. But Cox then crashed down on Carda, hip to chest, putting her forcefully on to the Williams Arena deck.
No call.
“Coming out of that (timeout) we got a pretty good look,” Lakeville coach Shelly Clemons said. “We got the ball to Temi. I think she got hammered and the refs missed that. That’s the way it goes sometimes.”
My buddy sitting next to me at courtside said, “They’re not going to make that call. They’re not going to make that call.” Meaning, an official is not going to put the winning points on the FT line with 3 seconds left in a state championship semi-final. So, in other words, there is a different set of rules in certain situations.
And all of you know what I think of that.
“I understand that,” Clemons said, “but when everything’s on the line, and you’ve got 3 seniors and this is their season and this is everything to them, and you find a way to get one of your big scorers the ball and she gets…it’s clearly a foul, it needs to be called, and that was a foul and it didn’t get called.”
I asked the Supervisor of Officials for the state tournament about this. He said, we meet with all of the officials for two hours, we go over all kinds of situations. And, as for interpreting the rules differently in certain situations, he said, “I hope we don’t do that. We are taught not to do that.”
But, a very well-respected, retired coach, who is part of the tournament advisory committee and the all-tournament committee and is heavily involved with Ms. Basketball, said, “I beg to differ. I’ve seen a lot of basketball games, and that just isn’t the case.”
“It’s been a big topic,” Clemons said. “We talk about it at our coaches meetings. It’s hard to find good officials. A lot of the good ones want to ref the boys and not the girls, unfortunately. But, not to put it on the officials. They make mistakes, I make mistakes, the players make mistakes. But, I think it can be better. I don’t have any of the answers for how to make it better. But this stings. It really hasn’t even hit home yet, to lose in the worst way.”