National Basketball Association

NBA announces expanded use of instant replay center for 2016-17 season

Published Nov. 15, 2016 2:53 p.m. ET

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Brett Pollakoff

The NBA announced expanded use of its off-site instant replay center on Friday, making a change it hopes will result in speeding up the process. From the official release:

This season, active referees in the NBA Replay Center will be responsible for determining the outcome of all replay situations except for player altercations and flagrant fouls, which will continue to be decided by on-court referees.  Examples of replays that will now be determined by the NBA Replay Center are foul calls coinciding with shot-clock violations as well as clear-path and end-of-quarter fouls.

Last season, the second year for the state-of-the-art NBA Replay Center in Secaucus, N.J., current referees were added to the Replay Center for all games to make decisions on certain replay situations and facilitate the on-court review of others.  The Replay Center ruled on 72 percent of all replays and the average review time for all replays was 31.9 seconds, a reduction of nearly 25 percent from the 2014-15 season (42.0 seconds).

The standard for overturning an on-court ruling -- “clear and convincing evidence” -- remains the same.

The replays that take the longest, of course, (and are the most frustrating to fans) are the ones that attempt to determine whether a clear-path foul has taken place. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is among those who have been in favor of changing it to avoid these prolonged delays.

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