The NBA has taken several steps to increase the accountability of officials in recent years. As relations between players and referees have soured, and teams have even gone as far as submitting audits of calls it believes officials missed, the league has expanded replay review and instituted Last Two Minutes reports to explain to fans where officials were right and wrong in the game’s biggest moments. The biggest change, however, came into play for the first time last night. Mike D’Antoni became the first coach in NBA history to challenge a call. 

Houston Rockets star James Harden was called for an offensive foul with a bit more than two minutes left in the fourth quarter. As the Rockets were in the bonus, D’Antoni knew that a reversal would have sent Harden to the free-throw line. But the call was upheld. Though it may not have worked out in its first usage, coaches now have a means of protecting their teams against bad calls from officiating in ways they never have before. 

The new rule was instituted this offseason with the following stipulations: 

• A challenge is initiated by calling a timeout and the challenging coach twirling his index finger in a circle. 
• Personal fouls called on the coach’s own team, out-of-bounds calls, goaltending and basket interference can be challenged. 
• Only personal foul calls are challengeable in the last two minutes of the game. Other reviews can only be triggered by officials in that time period. 
• Teams get only one challenge per game, regardless of whether or not it is successful. 
• For a call to be overturned, “there must be clear and conclusive visual evidence that the call was incorrect,” according to NBA.com. 
• If a team tries to use a challenge without having any timeouts, it will be assessed a technical foul.

As with any new rule, it is going to take coaches and officials time to adjust. There will certainly be missteps in its early adoption, and coaches are likely to lose more challenges than they win in the early going simply out of experimentation. But the NFL has seen quite a bit of success with coach’s challenges. Officiating will never be perfect, but adding an extra layer of accountability and the opportunity to fix calls that were missed brings the NBA closer to its ideal place than ever before.