Show Crime e Does Pa Pay T Tournament Figures Prove Cage Rule Needs Change By 3 Bill Commit enough fouls and you will win at it basketball Sounds crazy but C. C B. B Ledingham Ledingham Leding Leding- ham of f Ogden who has lias been tryIng tryIng trying try- try Ing to 10 get the rule makers to understand un un- what is going on proved his stand again in the state class A basketball tournament He has has' charts showing that the team which was was as fouled fo fouled led which should get the benefit for theother the theother other ther teams team's fouling actually is penalized penalised d. d Naturally the fans are penalized also for for watching a stream of guys pitching fouls is not exactly exciting Here is the way Ledingham can prove it works Team A fouls team B and everyone thinks that that- learn Jeam B g gets ts a but break break but it First it loses a Ii chance for for fora a field goal Second it it gives give's up the ball Third it gives ives te team m A a chance for a field goal goa two points to offset the chance f for r a 81 afoul foul pitch one ne point Average Scores Say both teams are making 30 of their field goal tries and 60 of ot their foul pitches This Is Is about average t I Thus a team with the ball moving moving moving ing will m mike make ke about one goal out of about three times Umes it sho shoots ts But it is fouled along the line somewhere so it loses loges that chance for the field goal Then it pitches the foul pitch and every time tim it makes the pitch the ball goes to the other team This team comes down the floor with that one out of three chances for fora a field goal And the figures Ledingham has charts of the games prove the advantage advantage advantage ad ad- vantage of trying for the field goals rather lather than giving up the ball on the foul pitch Another angle is th that t the defending team fear almost always takes th the ball all after a 1 missed foul pitch because of the advantage advantage advantage tage of being able to keep all five men congregated around the boards How flow About This Th Actually it might be wise for fora a team to waive all aU foul pitches and take the ball baU out of bounds Probably this team would score more points Ledingham has written to Vadal Peterson Petersen University of Utah coach and a member of the national nation l rules committee pointing out the fallacy of the penalty for a fo fouL L LIn In his latest letter he shows his figures on four games In the recent recent re re- re- re cent centA A tournament in Ogden There was was was' a a total of foul t tries In these games There was was a 8 total of 68 points m made de on foul pitches BU BUrT T there were 62 points made by teams immediately after gaining automatic possession of oc the ball after the foul pitches So for fouls the net loss for all of the penalties in Iri four faux games was wasa a mere six points Forced to to Foul Of all the games I charted at the class class A tourney Ledingham writes there was only one in which there were a few minutes of basketball That was in fn the second second sec sec- ond and quarter of the Jordan East-Jordan I game when nine field goals geals were scored without one fo foill l being called At that time Jordan was four points ahead of at East and in order to get back In the game East started a fouling spree and Jordan accommodated them by pitching the fouls and giving up possession of the balL baIt In that game Jordan had 16 tri tries s for nine ninepOints ninepoints ninepoints points and East scored 10 points b by getting the ball baU after the pitches There is a a. a simple solution which will do more for basketball than anything since Dr James A. A Naismith Naismith Naismith Nai- Nai smith Invented the game Ledingham Ledingham Leding Leding- ham believes Just change the rule so that the team pitching the foul the offended team gets the ball out of I bounds in after the pitch He believes and he pr probably bably is right that with this rule the f fouling fouling foul foul- ul- ul ing will immediately be slashed In half for tor f fouling will bring a areal areal real penalty r rather ther than the actual benefit that it tt does docs now Clas Classic lc Example Ledingham has been charting games for two years and the pattern pattern pattern pat pat- tern remains the same His classic example is the Brigham Young vs Vi Utah game in Springville At one onetime onetime time in this game Utah made six straight foul pitches but ut lost ground because BY B Y U was gaining possession of the ball after the pitches and going goin right down to lo tomake make two-point two field goals Fans and coaches have the ten tendency tendency ten ten- I d dency ncy to blame the officials for forthe forthe forthe the present status of basketball which Ledingham says should be called instead of basketball basket basket- ball However r there is Is' nothing the officials can do but call caU the f fouls and as long as a team gains ground by fouling you cant can't blame the play players rs for fouling As final proof roof of his point Ledingham Led Lcd Ledingham ingham points out this situation which has occurred in several games this year A play player r from team A steals steab the ball at starts dribbling for the basket He Heis Heis Heis is In the clear almost certain ofa of ofa a two-point two field goal Ca Can h St Stop p Score I A player from team B B. who is Js ison ison on his toes but bitt completely out of the play can immediately commit a a afoul foul right under the nose of an official The official blows his whistle calling the foul and the kid with the ball baU doesn't get a a aI I chance to go in for his Yes team A gets a foul pitch and possibly gets one point But it should have had two points for forthe forthe forthe the field foal oaL Then h n after the foul pitch team B gets the baUnd ball baU balland balland and nd has a one out of three chance to tomake make a afield field goal itself Should It do this the net gain for the fouling team would be three po points Who Vho says that crime doesn't pay pay J |