Sadly, we have allowed the coaches to delegate the full responsibility for legal equipment to the officials, and we have accepted it. There is no reason a coach should worry about this anymore. If a player is not legally equipped, one of two things will happen - 1) The officials not notice/ignore it. 2) The officials will politely ask the coach to fix it. The third option - a penalty won't be used.
In a class 6 state final about two years ago, a WH had the guts to up penalizing both teams (at separate times) for illegal equipment. I loved it and the state supported the crew.
Speak for yourself, most if not all officials I work with have NOT accepted ANY responsibility for wearing illegal equipment, although they do accept responsibility for PREVENTING such equipment to be worn. The basic object is to prevent such equipment BEING worn, by PREVENTING any player so equipped FROM PLAYING.
THERE IS no provision for STOPPING or DELAYING the game to remove illegal equipment, rather the protocol is to REMOVE the equipment or the PLAYER wearing ILLEGAL equipment Removal of the equipment may require a Charged TO, or result in a Delat of the Game if the RFP is adversely affected. If the equipment is discovered prior to the ball becoming alive, and the Team involved has allowable TOs available, a Charged TO may be used to affect the correction.(NF 3-5-2b) If no TOs are available, and the correction delays the RFP for more than 25 seconds, the player shall be replaced, for at least 1 play (NF:3-5-6).
Players actually playing with illegal equipment would be a violation of NF: 9-8m, a (revised) 5 yard UNC penalty, charged to the Head Coach.
