McCoy: Why Call THAT Technical???

By Hal McCoy

As a professional journalist it behooves me to be impartial when I cover the Cincinnati Reds and the University of Dayton Flyers.

With the Reds I have done that for more than 50 years and my impartiality wasn’t always appreciated.

Former owner Marge Schott banned me from the media dining room three times because she didn’t like stories I wrote.

Current Reds owner Bob Castellini tried to get me fired from Fox Sportrs Ohio’s web-site because of what he perceived as negative reporting.

As he said to me, “You and Paul Daugherty (formerly of the Cincinnati Enquirer are outstandingly great writers, but you kill us.”

The University of Dayton is a team of a different color. I’ve lived in Dayton since 1962 and I love UD basketball.

I covered the team for the Dayton Daily News in the late 1960s during the Don May, Bobby Joe Hooper and George Janky days.

Now I free lance for Sonny Fulks and Press Pros Magazine, a web-site. Yes, I root hard (under my breath and with no court-side gesticulations) for the Flyers, but I praise wben needed and criticize when needed in my stories.

And I rooted for the Flyers to beat Davidson Tuesday night in UD Arena.

But what transpired was a farce, a game decided by an official and that should never, never happen.

With 50 seconds to play, Davidson’s Hunter Adam scored under the basket to give his team a 61-59 lead.

The Davidson bench hardly had time to celebrate when one of the officials blew a technical foul on Adam, presumably for taunting. He allegedly said something offensive to Dayton’s Nate Santos after he scored — his only two point of the game.

Nobody seems to know exactly what he said, except the official, but it could not have been so offensive as to decide the game.

And it did. Javon Bennett made the two technical free throws to tie it, then scored a layup on the inbounds play after shooting the technicals. He was fouled and made that one, too.

Five points in two seconds and it decided the game.

If there is a legitimate physical foul in the final minute that could decide the game, then it should be called. I’ve seen games in the final minute where the attitude is, “No homicide, no foul.”

But a technical for yapping.

Earlier in the half, Davidson’s Mike Loughnane was dealt a technical foul for sucker punching Dayton’s Amael L’Etang in the stomach, knocking the breath out of the 7-foot-1 center.

That’s legitimate.

But the technical on Adam for mouthing off was the height of absurdity and I actually feel sorry for him and Davidson.

They lost a game in a manner that should never happen.

Some have suggested that the officials wanted UD to win, that perhaps they had bet on Dayton to win.

That is even more absurd. Those officials — Lee Cassell, Brian O’Connell and Lamar Simpson — are solid Atlantic 10 officials and called a good game.

Even if one had wagered on Dayton to win, the technical would not help him. The Flyers were favored by nine points and there was no way they were going to cover that spread.

And one last point. On the inbounds pass before Bennett made the lay-up, he was being held by a Davidson player and there was no whistle, no foul called.

But calling the technical was uncalled for. The officials needed to let the last 50 seconds play out and only call a truly physicxal foul.

The cliche is, “Words will never hurt me,” but Adam’s words turned out to be hurtful in the worst way for Davidson.