JustRules

Every year the NFHS puts out a survey for coaches and officials to get feedback on potential rule changes. If they are on these lists someone likely has submitted it and it will be considered by the rules committee when they meet in Indy in January. In the poll check the box if you would answer YES to the question. Observations – Have you observed any of the following this year? 1. Game officials having difficulty determining if the tight end is in the free-blocking zone. 2. Ball-colored helmets, jerseys, patches, exterior arm covers/pads, undershirts or gloves. 3. Applying the 5-yard face mask rule. 4. Field tarps in the team box too close to the field of play. 5. School bands playing while the opponent’s offense is on the field. 6. Announcers announcing or playing amplified music when an opponent’s offense is calling signals. About the rules for 2020 – Would you favor: 1. By state association adoption, using instant replay for regular season. 2. Allowing a player to save loss of yardage by throwing the ball so that it lands beyond the neutral zone, if the player is outside the free-blocking zone. 3. Not allowing visible numbers, logos, images or other symbols on the front of the tooth and mouth protectors. 4. Allowing the passer to spike the ball from the shotgun formation. 5. Making forward pass interference by the defense an automatic first down for the offense. 6. Making defensive personal fouls and unsportsmanlike conduct fouls an automatic first down for the offense. 7. With mutual agreement from both head coaches and the referee, shortening the halftime intermission to less than 10 minutes if a weather delay has occurred with less than three minutes in the second period. 8. Eliminating the free-blocking zone in the shotgun formation.

Maybe a little but I find it about the same. Both are usually 28-32 seconds left on the play clock. I think the reason the FBS guys support it though is their games are so long and it's a simple way to shorten it by a couple minutes. 15-minute quarters is like playing a 5-quarter HS game!

Under the 25 second play clock the game clock wouldn't start until the 25 second play clock was started which was usually 12-15 seconds after the previous play ended. A similar pace is expected now but the game clock is often started before the ball is ready for play. IO's estimate is accurate. We shoot for 30-32. NCAA using a similar play clock wants the game clock started even sooner (34-36).

DT started this thread because he wanted to get everyone's underwear in a wad and it worked. Of course this is a ridiculous idea. LN and LC fit very well in the MIC both geographically and demographically. They compete in most sports. They're records aren't great in the MIC but they get wins most years and are competitive in their losses. The coaches and athletes love being in the most competitive conference in the Midwest. There has been chatter about combining the schools but I'm not sure how serious it is. I hope they never do it.

This is definitely true. Community feel at the larger MIC schools can be more difficult. Small and medium cities are more connected because more families know each other and they tend to be associated with the school regardless if they have children in the school. Carmel and Center Grove are probably as close to that as you can get in the MIC. Warren and BD have had epic crowds in the past as people from all over the city would go to that game, but that interest seems to have waned a little. That would be hard to dispute. I think communities like Westfield, Zionsville, Brownsburg, and Avon in the HCC are more similar to Carmel/Center Grove than the Marion County MIC schools, but they still aren't the level of other communities. I've worked back to back weeks where we had more fans at Mississinewa than Pike.

I would say there is a very good chance! They are a solid, experienced crew. Technically 4 of the 5 have worked a state final but none with this referee. This won't be their first major experience like this and they had big games throughout the tournament.

I agree and could see that if it was a surprise onside kick. It was an obvious situation. It's the main thing that position needs to anticipate. They didn't show the R to see if he gave any kind of signal. They did give K the ball at the spot of the flag so it appears they awarded first touching properly. Not 100% certain the judgement part was right though because I knew they got the mechanic part wrong. Little things matter. Judgement is one thing. Mechanics are another.

The other factor is they have shown to keep county and district schools together. HSE and Fishers weren't likely to be split so unless you could move both of them south you aren't moving either of them south. So Carmel likely goes south even if they were located further north of HSE or Fishers. North/South doesn't have to be a hard straight line.

First touching as it's called in NFHS is not a foul so it should have been a bean bag rather than flag. It was a close call but the covering official loses some credibility by not using the correct mechanic.

It depends on what happens and the intensity and implications of the north south all star game are vastly different than a state final game. For example, a blocked FG, what does everyone do? Ball snapped at the B6 where do the deep wings go? Then you have a false start by the offense, does that change anything? Sideline catch/no catch communication and spots on long runs can also difficult if you've never done it. Back judge is probably the easiest transition because you do lose responsibilities on keys and you get the most help with the deep wings. But your keys are very different. In 5-man you have the widest receiver on the strong side (or press box if formation balanced) and widest 2 if you have trips. In 7-man you have the #2 receiver on the strong side (or press box if balanced) and #3 in trips. If you stick with your normal 5-man keys out of habit and the other wings watch who they are supposed to watch your guy will not be covered at the snap. If nothing happens to him nobody would know but it could be a big miss if he holds on the edge at the snap (assume TE most of the time) or a DB/LB holds him off the line trying to run his route. That's why I said a possible approach is the two wings and BJ watch what they normally watch and the deep wings focus on their zone. It's not optimal coverage but it's better than someone not being covered at all.

There would be some logistical challenges with going to 7-man because coverage and positioning are very different with 2 extra officials on the field. Since we don't know until the Monday before the game which crews are working that week how do you prepare them to work a mechanic they may have never worked? Most of the states that expand later in the tournament will have crews who worked 6 or 7-man during the season at least some games. They also assign individuals to playoff crews rather than advance existing crews so they have more flexibility in picking the officials who are familiar with the expanded mechanics. Ultimately I still think it would be better coverage. At a minimum you could have the original 5 members do what they normally do so we still have coverage and the extra 2 officials focus on their zone. The biggest advantage for the additional 2 officials are goal line/pylon coverage and special teams plays. I support this 100% and am confident we'd figure out something for the logistical challenges.

This is a very valid statement. Replay wouldn't guarantee every call was correct which is often the expectation when it's used. It could be helpful though if available. I am curious to hear how other states have used it. Hudl sideline could be helpful but you only have at most 3 cameras (more likely 1 or 2) and they don't always follow the action or zoom properly. Having a solid set of professional broadcast cameras would make it much more possible. If the only option is Hudl sideline I wouldn't support it.

Two legendary Indiana D3 coaches have retired. Bill Lynch announced his retirement earlier this week from DePauw and Mike Leonard announced his retirement today. These are two great men who have given so much to developing great leaders very much under the radar. They will both be hard to replace.

They are definitely still good and will be good in 5A but not necessarily any better than similar sized schools with less affluence.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs is a real thing. If you don't have safety as a basis it's hard to have anything else. That doesn't mean you still can't be successfully in a micro sense, but as a macro that's why more affluent schools can have a larger percentage of their good athletes be able to play and focus on football. If it was a guarantee Zionsville and Park Tudor would be dominant, but at Bob said it doesn't always apply. But not worrying about if you can get to games or practices or if you'll have food when you get home are big advantages. I worked an IPS game one year and they had #65 throwing to #72 in warm-ups. I asked the coach if those were his starting QB and receiver. He said they were today. He never knows until they get on the bus who will be playing that day. Some kids just don't show up. I doubt Carmel or Center Grove ever have that issue. It's not likely at township schools either, but more affluence and more stable home situations can be an advantage.

I was going to add the socio-economic difference for CG as well. Lawrence Township is probably one of the most diverse economically since it includes some of the wealthiest (much of Geist is in Lawrence Township) and the poorest (42nd and Post is one of the highest crime areas in the city) and everything in between. Despite the fact LN and LC have not beaten Carmel, looking at the scores many of the games have been competitive. LC didn't play Carmel in the regular season before 2013 because that's when they joined the MIC. Here is LN's history with Carmel: 2019 - lost 23-20 in OT 2018 - lost 23-9 2017 - lost 38-14 2016 - won 27-20 Here is LC's history with Carmel: 2019 - lost 20-7 2018 - lost 16-14 2017 - lost 21-19 2016 - lost 35-20 2015 - lost 35-26 2014 - lost 27-20 2013 - lost 17-7 For the most part those are pretty competitive games despite the number of losses.

Something didn't click for him there. The last year he had 50 players grades 9-12 so your 36 number sounds reasonable. In February Coach Mallory had 125 kids in the weight room and that would have only included grades 9-11 since the seniors were already done. There were a lot of boys in the building who wanted to play but didn't for some reason want to play for Coach Dilley. Mallory has kept those numbers up throughout his time. They have had a solid team the past 3-4 years but can't get over the hump consistently.

With the exception of a couple years with Jason West, LC and LN have been fairly even. I attribute the success those year as much to his coaching and the lack of athletes playing for Coach Dilley. Some of those players may have gone to LC instead, but most of them just chose to not play football. Once Mallory took over several existing students suddenly showed up in the weight room. They have both been competitive since but it's hard to win consistently in the MIC even for the big boys. So to say the schools similar in size to LN/LC/CG can't compete with the Carmel/BD/WC isn't just a size issue. It's also just the level of talent available in the Indy metro area is ahead of other regions in the state. I'm not sure exactly why, but it's true. I still admire the quality and effort of the teams outside of Central Indiana. They are still getting incredible high school football opportunities and won't back down to the central Indiana teams. But even if Carmel/BD/WC were to split in half, those teams would still be very competitive in the state.

I would be OK with that. However what is now a 5-yard facemask goes away as a foul. The NCAA 15-yard foul is the same as the NFHS 15 yard foul. Both require grabbing with pulling and twisting. The NFHS 5-yarder is just grabbing. I wouldn't want to make that a 15-yarder in NFHS.

LN, LC and CG all have about 2400 students and they often compete with and have beaten Carmel in recent seasons. And LN/LC have typically been in the bottom half of the MIC the past few seasons. This shows the MIC is better than every other conference in the state top to bottom. The HCC has a few teams that can also compete and beat MIC teams but outside of that very few can. This isn't a knock on any teams outside the MIC. It's just a fact the MIC and HCC teams have separated from the rest of the state.

It depends on the timing of the foul. If it was before the pass was completed the enforcement spot is the previous spot so either 1st and 5 (accepted) or 2nd and 7 (declined). If it was after the pass was completed the enforcement is the end of the run and replay the down. 1st and 3.

By philosophy that allows him/her to have his/her foot down in the neutral zone before the kick. I probably wouldn't allow him/her to run down the line in front of the ball and then kick it. That is not the intent of the rule. I'm not sure what advantage he/she would get by doing that thought.

The sheet the IFOA sends out with the crew assignments collected does indicate Regional 1-24 and Semi-State 1-12. I assume those are just for reference though.

He got to start working on his story early and hopefully finished well before the deadline?

A couple of them thought it was wrong at the time but they weren't certain enough to step up. As you know one of the challenges is remembering something if you never do it! I've been officiating about 20 years, and It think I've been a part of 3 or 4 OT games. Two of them were the same season. You can talk about something and read something 100 times, but until you experience it, it doesn't always commit to memory. That's not an excuse, but it does help people understand WHY it happens. It's not an intentional error.