Social media has been abuzz in recent days because of an officiating error that took place during the Inglewood-JSerra boys basketball playoff game Friday at JSerra High.
The CIF Southern Section will not take direct action and said it is not in position to do so, as we explain below.
What happened …
After a timeout late in the first quarter of the CIF Southern Section Division 1 semifinal that was won by JSerra, 103-91, six JSerra players went into the game.
About 20 seconds later, JSerra coaches noticed that six JSerra players were playing and yelled for Godschoice Eboigbodin to leave the court and take a seat on the bench.
JSerra coaches during the timeout had ordered a substitute for Eboigbodin who, JSerra coach Keith Wilkinson concludes, did not hear that he was coming out of the game.
All three game officials failed to see that JSerra had six players in the game. Inglewood players on defense did not see that they had six players in white uniforms coming downcourt at them to cover (on that possession, JSerra, even with six players, turned the ball over). It took around 20 seconds of play before any of the coaches noticed.
The JSerra scorekeeper, as the home-team scorekeeper he was the official scorer for the game, did not see that there were six JSerra players on the court. And I, seated courtside next to the JSerra scorekeeper, did not see that six JSerra players were on the court (Inglewood did not have a scorekeeper at the table).
As Eboigbodin exited the court with the ball still in play, and with JSerra ahead, 24-20, an Inglewood coach went onto the court to point out that JSerra had six players on the court. A game official gave Inglewood a technical foul. JSerra’s Jaden Bailes made both technical foul shots, making it 26-23.
If the officials had seen that JSerra had six players on the court, as they should have, then they would have understood the Inglewood coach’s action and perhaps not called the technical foul. A technical foul would instead be appropriate to assess to JSerra. Inglewood then would have received two technical foul shots.
CIF Southern Section spokesman and assistant commissioner Thom Simmons said it is up to the Long Beach unit of the California Basketball Officials Association to decide if the members of the game’s three-man officiating crew would work further playoff games.
The Southern Section does have some input there, from sport to sport.
“We look at the totality of the officiating unit and see if they should be working playoff games next year or in whatever rounds are left based on their performance,” Simmons said. “That’s what we can do as a section. The officiating units have the responsibility to make sure their officiating crews are efficient and they do that in many different ways.”
Simmons said it might be an overreaction to bar officials from working playoff games because of any one mistake.
“Officials make thousands of calls every single year,” Simmons said. “And we’re going to hold them to account for every single screwup? I don’t know if we want to do that, given the deficient numbers of officials we have as we speak.”
Maybe the technical foul call and the two free throws Bailes made gave JSerra a momentum boost.
To suggest the officials’ mistake changed the result, that it made one team the winner and the other the loser, is a false suggestion.
Because after Bailes made the two technical free throws, Inglewood star guard Jason Crowe Jr. made a long 3-point basket to beat the end-of-first-quarter buzzer. That cut the JSerra lead to 26-23 and excited the Inglewood bench and the Inglewood supporters seated behind the bench.
In the second quarter JSerra outscored Inglewood, 35-24.
JSerra sophomore forward Ryan Doane in that quarter made all six of his close-in shots for 12 points, some off of his offensive rebounds, and Bailes made three of the Lions’ five 3-point baskets second-quarter baskets.
JSerra thus led at halftime, 61-47, and would go on to win by 12 points.
That second quarter was more important to the outcome than the technical foul call and the technical foul free throws.
The Lions play Crean Lutheran in the Division 1 championship game at Toyota Arena in Ontario on Saturday at 4 p.m.