The Front Row with JASON ELLIOTT June 29, 2011

Maybe it was a good thing that the weather wasn't as warm as usual on Saturday afternoon for the annual Hoopfest 3-on-3 basketball tournament on the streets of downtown Spokane.

With all kinds of crazy antics, from fights to an unrelated shooting in the area around Riverfront Park last year, the only sounds this year were those of whistles and the ball hitting the pavement.

Exactly what is expected at a basketball tournament.

IN THE past two trips I've made over to Hoopfest, there's been a common theme - at some point, somewhere, there's going to be some upset people.

That was the case again this year, just as quickly as the tournament had begun.

During a game just a few minutes after the start of the tournament, a fan was questioning the result of a game after a half-hour time limit had expired.

Neither team had scored the 20 points necessary to win a game at the tournament, which also was a case in another game I witnessed on Saturday.

A fan, who I'm convinced had never seen the Hoopfest rules, began yelling at a court monitor after his team had came up short following the 25-minute time limit.

According to the Hoopfest rules, if neither team has achieved 20 points and neither holds a two-point lead, they activate overtime rules. During overtime, the team must score two points more than the leading team's score at the beginning of the session, or be the first to 20 points.

In this case, the team that was trailing rallied to win 18-17 after outscoring their opponents 3-1 in overtime.

At tournaments such as this one, there's a time limit for a reason and in most cases, they are played out within that time.

If not, well, you're in trouble.

TIME LIMITS, while sometimes unnecessary, are a good thing in tournaments such as Hoopfest.

Depending on the bracket, there is probably no way some of those younger divisions could get to 20 points, no matter what the time limit tells them.

I’ve seen the same thing happen while monitoring courts at Silver Hoops in the past, and in most cases, the time limit could have gone a few times before the game could have reached 20.

Silver Hoops has since gone away with the time limits in the adult divisions.

But to have a situation where two teams (adult teams) can’t get to 20 points, there comes a point when the game should just end.

Games that are defensive stalemates are good at times, but when they wind up having more missed shots than points, that’s when the problem arises.

Those time limits, regardless of what the score is, are necessary to not only the safety of those involved, but to keep the tournament moving at a steady pace — and most importantly, to not have as many stressed players on the hot pavement of Spokane.

With more than 6,700 teams playing on more than 400 courts, just imagine if a few of those games went a few minutes over their time — there might have been chaos to crown champions in the various brackets.

This year, there wasn’t a lot of those issues that I’ve seen during the tournament in recent years.

Only basketball on a weekend that had been missing it for far too long.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d’Alene Press. He can be reached via telephone at 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or by email at jelliott@cdapress.com.