As Mississippi State swingman Ravern Johnson drove by his defender and soared towards the basket, Washington Huskies center Jon Brockman slid across the lane and established position under the ring. The two players collided, Johnson missed the shot, Washington got the rebound, and no call was made by the official watching the play. The narrator's voice then intoned, "Call this play a blocking foul. You no longer have the option of passing on this play."

That sequence, which occurred during the first round of the 2009 NCAA tournament, is included on the DVD that the NCAA sends out annually to referees explaining rules changes and points of emphasis for the coming season. The play involving Johnson and Brockman was used to illustrate what John Adams, the NCAA's coordinator of officials, said on the video "may be the most difficult officiating issue we have to deal with this season." He was referring to the new rule that requires refs to call a block on a secondary defender who attempts to take a charge under the basket.

Many fans mistakenly believe that there has long been an explicit rule against taking a charge under the basket. The misconception existed because referees generally followed an unwritten rule that even if a defender established position, the play should result in a no-call –- sort of like the way baseball umpires treat the "neighborhood play" by allowing an infielder to get an early jump off second base while turning a double play. In May, the NCAA's men's basketball rules committee decided that a no-call in this situation wasn't good enough. It put in writing that an official must call a blocking foul. That rule will go into effect this season.

"This change is a very good attempt at stopping the incessant flopping that's been going on for years," says Siena coach Fran McCaffrey, who joined the rules committee this month. "In the past, the ref wouldn't call anything. He'd say, 'Get up, you're flopping.' Meanwhile, a guy missed the shot because the defender disrupted him."

Still, many coaches, McCaffrey included, believe the committee did not go far enough because it declined to put an arc on the floor to clearly delineate the new restricted area. At the ACC's media day this week, Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski called that decision (or non-decision) "a joke." There is also a strong sentiment among officials in favor of having an arc similar to the one the NBA uses. "It certainly would help the referee if we have a line painted," says John Clougherty, the ACC's officiating coordinator. "They have to referee a guy's feet but they're taking a guess on it. How accurate would they be if we had an imaginary three-point line?"

It would seem obvious that if the committee members were going to pass this new rule that they would also put in the new line. So why didn't they?

The biggest reason was they couldn't agree on just how big the arc should be. The new rule calls for the restricted area to extend from the front and sides of the rim to the backboard, which is approximately 24 inches by 18 inches. That is considerably smaller than the NBA's arc, which stretches eight feet in diameter. "The NBA wants the offense to have a huge advantage anywhere near the basket, but we didn't want to create that," says Charlotte coach Bobby Lutz, a member of the rules committee.

By deciding not to establish a line right away, the committee left itself some wiggle room for next year. The members can see how the rule worked this season and then decide if they want to put a new line on the floor, and if so how big it should be.

The second reason the committee balked was procedural. In 2003, the NCAA created the Playing Rules Oversight Panel (or PROP) to streamline the process by which rules get put into action. (I know, just what the NCAA needs: more bureaucracy.) These rules are now being implemented in two-year cycles, and since men's college basketball is beginning the first year of the new cycle, the NCAA is supposed to wait another year before putting major changes into effect. Ty Halpin, the NCAA's liaison to the rules committee, told me that if the rules committee felt strongly that there should be a line on the floor this season, it would have gotten done, but the more the members learned about this process at their meeting, the more it gave them pause.

Some speculated that the committee was worried about the cost of requiring schools to add an arc, but Halpin told me that was not a factor. It's far less expensive to draw a new line than it is to move a line that already exists, as the committee required last year when it extended the three-point line. A bigger concern was the aesthetics of making such a drastic change. To put yet another line on an already cluttered court, the folks in that meeting would have had to be really committed to it.

In the end, the committee erred on the side of caution. "The onus is on the coaches to teach our players to get out from under the basket. This rule is supposed to be a deterrent," says Notre Dame coach Mike Brey, who also sits on the rules committee. "Do we really need the line on the floor? We have to examine that. Maybe if we lessen those collisions, it will be enough."

As Adams indicated on the DVD, this new rule will be a major topic of conversation during the season. If there is a lot of complaining from coaches and officials about the lack of an arc, you can expect there will be one in place next year.

Check back in for more juicy tidbits from the NCAA's officiating DVD tomorrow, including how Adams wants his refs to officiate all those swinging elbows that became a rampant problem last season.

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