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The game

Officials made the right decision ending the North Carolina-Iowa State game after a bizarre timing error followed the Cyclones' game-winning shot. Even a call that went UNC's way wouldn't have left much time to do anything than heave and pray. But that doesn't mean the Tar Heels shouldn't have plenty of beef with the way things went down Sunday night in their 85-83 loss in San Antonio.


Iowa State's DeAndre Kane hit the go-ahead shot with time running out in the third-round game. The ball fell through the basket with 1.9 remaining and gave the Cyclones a two-point lead. But, because of a late hand by the clock operator, the game clock didn't stop until there was 1.6 on the clock. Then, when UNC's Nate Britt caught the inbound, the clock was late in starting again. A full second elapsed before the time moved, then it didn't stop when Britt signaled for timeout with 0.7 seconds left. It was timing chaos.


Officials met on the sideline. How should they treat a clock that stopped late, started late and then stopped late again, all in a span of a few seconds?



The refs ended the game, declaring that the timing error gave UNC too much time and that the timeout came after the game should have ended. That decision earned no protest from North Carolina coach Roy Williams.


Was it the right call? Yes and no.


Yes, just about 1.7 seconds elapsed between the time Britt caught the ball and the moment the timeout was called. In that way, the game should be over. You don't get extra time because the clock operator had poor reflexes.


But was the clock ever right to begin with? A look at the replay shows there could have been more time added to the clock after Kane's basket.



There's 1.9 seconds on that clock when the ball passes through the net, not the 1.6 that UNC had on the inbound. The refs made the right call based on the wrong information. If there was 1.9 seconds left when Carolina threw the ball in, the maybe there should have been 0.2 seconds on the clock after the timeout.


That's not enough time to get off a shot and barely enough time for a tip. And even so, calling a timeout was the wrong play no matter how much time was on the clock. There was opportunity for a game-winning half-court shot and Britt passed it up for the timeout, a low-percentage play.


But it's not Carolina's fault the clock operator screwed up all parts of the play. Once the clock ran too long after the basket, the game never recovered. As a result, players, coaches and fans were stripped of a fair finish.


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