By TOM WILLIAMS

Almost everybody wants to get past the two minutes of angry words that marred the exciting Atlantic City-Mainland basketball game 10 days ago. There were no physical confrontations, no punches and just one shove. Basically, just some heated words. The game continued with no incidents, the Vikings won a thriller and the teams shook hands.

But, a day later, the NJSIAA announced that Atlantic City had violated a rule and would not be permitted in the state basketball tournament.

A stupid rule!

It all started when an Atlantic City player missed his first free throw and walked away from the line. When he started to return to the line, a Mainland player was in his path. Instead of walking around, he shoved the Mainland player in the back. That was an automatic technical foul. And that was the only physical confrontation.

Atlantic City coach Wayne Nelson argued the technical, as most coaches would do. He received a technical foul and backed away toward his bench. But he was upset by a dialog from some Mainland players, two of whom were pointing their fingers at him and reportedly using highly inappropriate language.

Nelson over-reacted, lecturing the players as he followed them toward their bench. But game officials and assistant coaches from both teams convinced him to back away. The Atlantic City player who earned the original technical foul made his second free throw and Mainland made three of the four free throws the team was awarded by the two technicals.

The NJSIAA rule says, “Any player that leaves the bench area during an altercation, whether to intervene or participate, shall be disqualified, and will be subject to the disqualification penalty (automatically disqualified from the next two contests.) Only coaches can leave the bench with the purpose of restraining players and stopping the altercation.”

Another rule says, “Any varsity team accumulating three or more player or coach disqualifications prior to the start of the tournament will not be permitted to participate in the state tournament.“

Now, think about that.

A teenage student-athlete is sitting on the bench and he sees an altercation on the court. His first reaction is to stand up, either to see better or to make sure none of his teammates are in trouble. If he steps onto the court, thereby leaving the bench area, he is, according to the rule, ejected.

It doesn’t matter if he pulled teammates away trying to stop the confrontation, ran on and threw a punch at somebody or just watched. All are treated the same.

That means the player cannot play in the next two games.

But then, there is that second rule. If three players or coaches from the same team are ejected over the course of the season the team is eliminated from the state tournament. Nothing has to have happened, they don’t have to have displayed any poor sportsmanship, they just have to stand up and cross the sideline onto the court.

Now, we can all understand the goal of keeping as many people off the court or field when a potential problem breaks out among the teams. But why should that include players not participating in the incident and those whose goal is to “intervene”.

Comparing this angry incident to what we saw last year between Camden and Camden Eastside, or others that we’ve seen over the years, is ridiculous. This was a few minutes filled with angry words and gestures – it was not a melee or a scrum. It was just a group argument.

The NJSIAA needs to eliminate – or, at least, fine tune – these two rules. The game officials are there to deal with incidents and just about every game is on video. Lets suspend or eject individuals who actively participate in angry physical incidents of poor sportsmanship, not throw a blanket over everybody who stands up off the bench and steps away from that area onto the court.

The NJSIAA has always complained about the time they have to deal with controversies. That is why many of their rules are so generally specific, so they won’t have to spend time dealing with the facts of each. That is a primary reason why they just changed the transfer rule, making it easier to switch schools and greatly reducing the number of challenges they have to deal with.

But now, with decisions like these, made after the fact from video, they are setting a precedent that must concern game officials. Nobody was ejected from the Atlantic City-Mainland game. Two technical fouls were charged against two people who deserved them. And the game concluded with no more incidents. Will this mean the NJSIAA, already claiming to be too busy, will have to deal with every video sent to them about decisions made in a game?

One more thing.

If you look at the video, during the peak of the arguments there are nine or ten players away from the bench area for Atlantic City. Most are just standing around, some are pulling teammates away. Only five of them are permitted on the court, so the rest of them violate the rule.

But Mainland has nine or ten players on the court, too. Plus a couple fans who came out of the bleachers.

Now, understand, the feeling here is that neither team should receive a death penalty for the basketball season. This was a situation that might have been very serious but the people involved calmed things down.

It is not my opinion that both teams should be eliminated from the state tournament – hopefully that has become clear. But, according to the rule and the video, both teams should have received the same penalty – a ridiculously harsh penalty.

Hopefully, the NJSIAA will see the light and not eliminate anybody from post season participation because a few players stepped over the sideline.

It’s a stupid rule!