March 20, 2024 – College and high school hardwoods aren’t the only venues that heat up with fierce competition each March.
Each spring across America, disputes that began on a basketball court end up in circuit court, with schools or athletes and parents squaring off against state interscholastic athletic associations.
The cases are often sparked by a disputed officials’ decision.
One example is St. Thomas More High School, Inc. v. Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, a case filed in Milwaukee County Circuit Court in March 2022.
On March 4, 2022, St. Thomas More High School led Howard Fuller College Academy by 30 points near the end of a WIAA boys basketball regional semifinal.
A St. Thomas More player grabbed an offensive rebound with 51 seconds on the clock and ended up in a tussle with a Howard Fuller College Academy player.
As the Howard Fuller College Academy bench players and some of their fans rushed onto the court, the St. Thomas More coach stepped onto the court in attempt to defuse the situation.
St. Thomas More players ran onto the court from the bench and separated their teammate, who had grabbed the rebound. The other four St. Thomas More players who’d been in the game stepped away from the fracas.
The officials declared the game over and left the court.
WIAA Orders Forfeit
In a report filed with the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association (WIAA), the officials wrote that “[w]ith both benches being cleared, all players would have been given flagrant technical fouls for fighting and no players would have been left eligible to finish the game if the floor could have been cleared.”
Jeff M. Brown, Willamette Univ. School of Law 1997, is a legal writer for the State Bar of Wisconsin, Madison. He can be reached by email or by phone at (608) 250-6126.
Based on the officials’ report, the WIAA told St. Thomas More that all its varsity players were suspended and ineligible for the regional final against Brown Deer High School scheduled for March 5, 2022.
After St. Thomas More declined to call up junior varsity players for the regional final, the WIAA ruled that St. Thomas More had forfeited the regional semifinal and awarded the regional championship to Brown Deer.
St. Thomas More sued the WIAA on March 9, 2022.
St. Thomas More sought a declaratory judgment that its players were eligible to play in the regional final. The school also sought a temporary restraining order (TRO) that would:
St. Thomas More argued that a review of video of the end of the game against Howard Fuller showed that one of the St. Thomas More players never left the bench, and that four players in the game at the time of the tussle stepped away to de-escalate the commotion.
The circuit court agreed with St. Thomas More and issued a TRO on March 9, 2022.
In addition to enjoining the WIAA from enforcing the suspensions and the forfeit, the circuit court ordered the WIAA to reschedule the game between St. Thomas More and Brown Deer.
On March 10, 2022, St. Thomas More beat Brown Deer High School 83-76 to advance to the WIAA state tournament, where they lost in the semifinals. In October 2022, St. Thomas More and the WIAA announced a settlement; the terms were not disclosed.
Buzzer Beater?
A blown call on a buzzer-beater in a high school boys basketball playoff game led to a similar lawsuit in New Jersey earlier this month.
On March 5, 2024, the Manasquan Warriors beat the Camden Panthers in a playoff semifinal when one of their players put back an offensive rebound a split second before the final buzzer sounded.
The officials originally awarded the basket to Manasquan. But after conferring near the scorer’s table, the officials waved off the basket and left the court. The decision gave Camden a 46-45 win.
A video replay clearly showed that on the final shot, the ball left the Mansquan player's hand before time expired.
The Manasquan Board of Education filed an order to show cause in the Chancery Division for Ocean County. The court dismissed the complaint for a lack of jurisdiction on March 7.
The board petitioned the state Department of Education to reverse the officials’ decision and overturn the result of the game. But the department’s commissioner denied the petition on March 8.
The Manasquan Board of Education then sought a TRO in the Superior Court of New Jersey Appellate Division.
The appellate court denied the requested relief, holding that the rules of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association provided no avenue of appeal from an erroneous call by game officials.
“While the consequences of a particular call may be unfortunate for a team, the NJSIAA’s regulations recognize the reality that game officials’ calls are frequently disputed, and that permitting such calls to be challenged on the basis of error would result in ongoing litigation, appeals, and scheduling issues, since no game could be considered final if its outcome is disputed in court as a result of an alleged error by officials,” wrote Judge Jospeh Marcyzk.
Unsportsmanlike Conduct
The basketball court isn’t the only launching pad for lawsuits against state interscholastic athletic associations.
Take Halter v. Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, No. 2021AP525 (Feb. 28, 2024), an opinion issued by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals last month.
On Feb. 2, 2019, Waterford Union High School sophomore Hayden Halter won the Southern Lakes Conference boys’ varsity wrestling championship in the 120-pound class. During the championship match, the referee gave Halter two unsportsmanlike conduct calls.
Under WIAA rules, any athlete who receives two unsportsmanlike conduct calls in a single meet is suspended for the “next competitive event.”
By winning the conference title, Halter qualified for a WIAA Division 1 varsity regional meet on Feb. 9, 2019.
But Halter, who’d wrestled at the varsity level for every meet in his high school career up to that point, registered for the Badger Invitational, a junior varsity/varsity reserve meet that took place several days before the regional varsity meet.
Halter then sat out the Badger Invitational as a way of serving his suspension.
The WIAA told the Waterford Union athletic director that it regarded Halter’s entry into the Badger Invitational event as an attempt to “circumvent” the rules on serving his suspension.
On Feb. 7, 2019, Halter and his father Shawn Halter sued the WIAA in Racine County Circuit Court.
On the same day, the Halters filed a notice of appeal on the WIAA Board of Control, pursuant to the WIAA’s rules of eligibility. WIAA denied the Halters’ appeal and said that there was no appeal to the WIAA board available to the Halters.
The Halters then sought a TRO allowing Halter to wrestle in the regional meet. The circuit court granted the TRO.
Halter won the regional competition and went on to win the 120-pound class championship at the state tournament in Madison.
WIAA Is a State Actor
In May 2021, the circuit court ruled for the WIAA. That decision nullified Halter’s state championship and all his results from the regional competition through the state tournament.
The Halters appealed.
In a 2-1 vote, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals ruled for the Halters.
The court of appeals held that the WIAA was a state actor, based on the following:
The WIAA is a single-state association with about 80% public school members;
Nine of the eleven WIAA board members represent public schools; and
the state Department of Public Instruction appoints a liaison to the board.
“For all practical purposes, Wisconsin public high schools have outsourced athletic programming and competitions to WIAA by making that association’s rules and programs their own,” Judge Maria Lazar wrote, after explaining that the WIAA’s actions would not be subject to judicial review if it wasn’t a state actor.
Rules Cannot Be Arbitrary
Lazar acknowledged that voluntary associations are free to set guidelines without judicial interference.
However, Judge Lazar explained that under persuasive authority from the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, a voluntary high school athletic association may not arbitrarily make or enforce its rules.
“This is especially true when a challenge is brought by a student rather than a member school of the voluntary association,” Lazar wrote. “Unlike member schools … a student like Halter has ‘no voice in [the association’s] rules or leadership.”
‘Will Not Judgment’
Judge Lazar pointed out that the term “next competitive event” is undefined in the WIAA rules.
She also concluded that nothing in the WIAA rules for eligibility supported the WIAA’s interpretation that “next competitive event” referred to the next event at the same level as the event at which the unsportsmanlike conduct calls were made.
Lazar pointed out that after Halter sat out the Badger Invitational, the WIAA added wording to the relevant rule specifying that a suspension must be “served at the same level of competition as the disqualification.”
That change, Judge Lazar reasoned, was evidence the WIAA believed its rules needed clarification. She also pointed out that the WIAA admitted that Halter was eligible to wrestle in the Badger Invitational.
She concluded that the WIAA’s decision that Hatler was ineligible to wrestle in the regional “was one of its will, not its judgment.”
“WIAA wanted to see Halter deemed ineligible for regionals, and it continues to assert that it was ‘only fair’ for Halter to miss regionals because that punishment more appropriately fits the crime – but that is not the standard set out in its own rules,” Judge Lazar wrote.
As a result of the court of appeals decision, Halter had his 2019 state championship restored.
Conclusion
As March Madness takes hold at the high school and college levels, lawsuits lurk. As these cases demonstrate, the game can still be won or lost off the court, in court.
