HOUSTON—The NBA’s competition committee — a select group of coaches, general managers and team presidents — has plenty of stuff on its plate, dealing with basically all aspects of the game on the court.

Its next meeting might be a wild one.

Given the incident in Sacramento on Sunday night, where the Raptors had a game-tying basket denied when officials dealt with a “clock malfunction.” at least two members of the committee want some discussion of the rules as they exist now.

Even if the referees in that game followed the letter of the law — and it appears they did — taking a look at that rule will be on the mind of Raptors president Masai Ujiri and Los Angeles Clippers coach Doc Rivers. Both feel that taking most of the human element out of some decisions might be a bit of a stretch in the impossible search for the perfectly officiated game.

“We want to get it right. We want to get everything right in the league,” Rivers said this week, discussing the decision to overturn a Terrence Ross basket — a ruling made a continent away from the Sacramento arena by an official looking at a clock in the league’s replay centre in Secaucus, N.J.

“That one is a tough one, but there has to be some kind of human element in the game, otherwise the games will last 16 hours if we looked at every single call.”

That’s probably the bigger issue, and one that hits at the heart of the Raptors-Kings controversy. The rules say referees must look at a clock malfunction at the end of the game, but what about other times when a tenth of a second here or there might matter? For instance, if the replay centre put its micro-timing device on the moment DeMarcus Cousins got possession of a missed Kyle Lowry free throw and called time out, would it have added a tenth of a second or two that would have made Ross’s shot legal? What about the 24-second shot-clock violation immediately preceding Ross’s shot? If they were able to back up time earlier in the final minutes, would it have mattered?

They can’t look at everything — that would be mind-numbing and lead to Rivers’s 16-hour games, which nobody wants. — but when is human error, or human reaction, better than intensive video replay scrutiny? That’s perhaps the bigger question.

“So, it’s a tough one for sure and I don’t know where the line is at, I really don’t,” Rivers said.

Leaving room for human nature in officiating may not make the game perfect, but perfection is hard to attain; no one can tell anyone connected with the Raptors that it was a perfect, by-the-rules ending to the Sacramento game.

Part of sports, a large part, is human failing — missed shots, missed plays, missed calls. It’s impossible to legislate that out. The subjective nature of when to chase it is a question that needs examining.

“I’m not sure how they chose between malfunction and human error,” Ujiri said of the Kings game. “I’m not sure how they concluded that.”

WESTBROOK WITHOUT W’S

There is no dispute that Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder is off to a blistering start offensively. He’s piling up triple-doubles with alarming regularity and dominating now that he’s free from sharing the load with Kevin Durant. The same can’t be said for his team of late, though. While the Thunder have an okay record, they’re letting what should be winnable games slip away. This week, they were beaten by the Detroit Pistons, who were without all-star centre Andre Drummond, and then by the Indiana Pacers, without all-star forward Paul George. Those are the kind of early-season losses that can bite a team in the butt when it comes to playoff seeding.

PALACE REVOLT

For almost 30 years the Detroit Pistons have played in the Palace of Auburn Hills, a suburban arena basically stuck in the middle of nowhere that was theirs and theirs alone. No more. The Pistons will move downtown to the Little Caesars Arena smack dab in the middle of Detroit starting next season, joining with the NHL’s Red Wings in a building that’s expected to help revitalize the moribund city core. Along with the downtown-based Detroit Tigers and Lions, the city’s pro sports franchises are truly trying to invigorate a deteriorating neighbourhood.

TART POP

San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich is one of the most quotable coaches in the league, willing to offer opinions, call out foolish questions and rant when he feels compelled to. He was all-world in his post-game soliloquy on Monday night, discussing his team’s play in a victory over the Dallas Mavericks. “You know, they had some guys out, we had some guys out, but they had a lot more out than we did. I thought we showed a lack of humility, a lack of respect for the opponent, a very pathetic performance at both ends of the court, both in execution and in grunt, in fibre, in desire. It was an awful performance. Oh, and they deserved to win the basketball game, I forgot to say that.”

SPEAKING OF THE MAVS

Popovich may have thought Dallas deserved to win that game over the Spurs, but it was a week of near historic ineptitude for the Mavs. They have lost, at times, this season: Dirk Nowitzki, J.J. Barea, Deron Williams, Devon Harris and Andrew Bogut. To say they’ve struggled on offence is an understatement. Last Friday, the Mavs scored just 64 points and were saved from a franchise low when Nicolas Brussino hit a three-pointer in the dying seconds. The record of 62 points was set by Dallas in 1997.

KERR’S ASTERISK

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Golden State’s Steve Kerr was lauded as the coach who got to 150 career wins the fastest in NBA history this week, when his regular season record went to 150-76. It’s a wonderful accomplishment — that’s an astonishing record of which to be proud — but is it real? Included in those 150 wins were 39 at the start of last season, when Luke Walton filled in on an interim basis while Kerr recovered from back surgery. It is not to take away from Kerr’s obvious coaching talents, but the numbers should probably reflect bench reality.

LOVE SHAQ

When it’s all said and done, there is every possibility that Shaquille O’Neal will have his number retired by three different franchises, such was his impact on the Orlando Magic, Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat. Miami is jumping into the fray, announcing this week that O’Neal’s No. 22 will be retired at a Dec. 22 game against — yes — the Lakers. The Heat have only retired two numbers in their history, those worn by Tim Hardaway and Alonzo Mourning, although they have also “retired” No. 23 as a tribute to Michael Jordan, as odd as that might seem.