We also know the best crews are the ones that realize their work isn’t done when the final horn sounds and they walk off the floor. Postgame de-briefings are extremely important, as they allow us to reflect on what just happened, discuss any noteworthy plays or rulings, and glean insights that can help us become better officials moving forward.

However, I would posit that on a night-in, night-out basis, the one necessary period of banter that we sometimes short-change, and the one we absolutely shouldn’t given the possible implications of doing so, is the halftime discussion between the crew.

Think about it. A pregame addresses what we expect to happen. A postgame addresses what already happened. A halftime discussion addresses what is happening.

It’s an opportunity to share realtime information and combine the best of both worlds of a pregame and a postgame. We now have one half’s worth of relevant information to draw upon for our next 16 minutes (NFHS) or 20 minutes (NCAA) of work. We aren’t discussing plays and situations and thinking about how to better officiate them two days from now when we next step back out on the floor. We should be using that knowledge to become better officials in the next 10 minutes.

Often I have worked on crews that view halftime as nothing more than break time. Use the toilet, drink some Gatorade, get off one’s feet for a couple minutes in the changing room and then back at it. Officiating crews that use halftime in that manner are wasting a valuable opportunity to prepare for the second half. And as most of us have said at one point or another in our officiating careers, anyone can officiate a first half. The second half is when we earn our paychecks.

So what should you be doing at halftime, in addition to the aforementioned personal business?

Discuss the first half

Just as both teams are in their respective locker rooms discussing what worked and what didn’t from their perspectives before halftime, the officiating crew should be doing the same thing. How is crew communication? How is the crew’s consistency? Is every member of the crew calling the same game? Are you comfortable with the game you have been calling? Are there any plays or rulings that need immediate attention?

Share what you know

With one half in the books, your Spidey sense should be tingling about bits of information to share with your partners. Have you identified the “game wreckers” for each team? Has there been some type of discussion or interaction that makes you aware that a particular coach is going to be problematic going forward? Have you had to issue a subtle warning to players in the low post about clearing the lane or too much off-ball contact? Share those observations with your partners so that no one is caught by surprise in the second half and the entire crew can fine-tune its collective radar.

Talk about adjustments

Good teams are those that can take what just transpired, learn from it and make immediate adjustments in the second half. This is true for the coaches and players, and it’s likewise true for the officials. Is one team shooting a lot of threepointers, necessitating the need for the perimeter officials to do a better job of locking in on airborne shooters? Is one team playing a fullcourt, trapping defense that will require a more engaged “C” official in the backcourt? Does the crew need to rotate more or less? Use what happened in the first half to put your crew in the best position to succeed in the second half.

Call the same game

While second-half adjustments are important, second-half overhauls are a recipe for disaster. Officials hear all the time that all coaches and players really want is consistency. They now have a full half’s worth of information about how your crew is working the contest. Now is not the time to completely change course on them. If your crew came out with a tight whistle in the first half, it should be the same after the break. Adjusting means putting yourself in the best position to work the game, not making drastic philosophical shifts in how often you put air in the whistle. Call the same game and make the players adjust — it should not be the other way around.

The dreaded “O” word

The reality is, you will be working free basketball at some point in your officiating career. The basketball gods will make sure of it. And when that happens, you need to be prepared to do so in proper fashion. Halftime is when your crew needs to have the discussion about how to proceed if the game goes into overtime. This isn’t hockey. You don’t get a second intermission. Instead, the final horn sounds, everyone re-calibrates after the exuberance of a hard-fought game that remains tied, and now you must elevate your game for the most crucial four or five minutes of the contest. Use halftime to discuss the key OT parameters. How long is it? Do the timeouts carry over? How many stoppages are now allowed? How is the bonus rule administered? And, should the unfortunate arise, how are technical fouls handled if they occur between the final buzzer and the start of overtime play?

If halftime sounds like a busy 10 minutes, that’s because it is. Sure, enjoy the physical break and nourishment that will allow you to be at your best for the second half. But remember mentally, your work is just beginning. Take one minute to collect your thoughts, re-engage and show your partners there is a very good reason why they want to share the floor with you during the second half.

Scott Tittrington is an associate editor at Referee. He officiates high school and college basketball, umpires high school and college baseball, and officiates high school football.

The post Don’t Sell Your Halftime Short  appeared first on Referee.com.

Game Personality Awareness

We know that individual games have their own personalities. There are conference rivalries, non-conference rivalries, blowout games, games where every possession matters, games that are very chippy, etc. Going into the game, it is helpful to have a sense of what personality the game may take beforehand. If not, you have to identify the game’s personality right away.

For example, Xavier and Cincinnati is an intense rivalry. The crosstown teams know each other, given the universities are within a few miles of each other. Often in these types of match-ups, the game will have started before it actually starts — social media can be used beforehand to stew emotions. In these games, officials need to be aware of dead-ball situations and  an increased likelihood for unsporting behavior.

Conversely, you may be involved in game that is going really well with everyone behaving very sportingly. Then out of the blue someone gets a little excitable on the bench. In those cases it may not be beneficial to immediately issue a technical foul.

In either situation, officials need to know the personality of the game and be aware of the context of the game so they understand when something is out of character for the game. Lacking an understanding of the context of a game and adding fuel to a fire with a technical foul will not help the game. It wakes everyone up and can make the game more challenging for the crew.

Substitution Awareness

As the game goes on, dig deeper to figure out why a substitute is coming in the game. Some reasons a substitute may be coming into the game include: to shoot threes, block shots, play defense, disrupt, give or take a foul, playing time, etc.

Every time a substitution occurs, ask yourself why. Sometimes it may be that the player is in foul trouble. Or it may be the team’s normal substitution pattern for that player to get a rest.

However, be aware of abnormal situations. When a starter leaves the game three minutes into the first quarter (or half) with no fouls, a red flag should go up in your mind.

Throughout the game, be aware of the normal substitution patterns of the teams. Awareness of patterns can allow a better understanding of what may be required of you and your coverage. Know each team’s first player off the bench. Who is the team’s spark plug? Who is the team’s post presence?

Some substitutions to look for:

• First substitute into the game.
• Player goes out for foul trouble.
• Impact substitutions.
• First substitute of second half.
• Post player gets substituted with no foul trouble.

The team’s stats help to provide likely scenarios for who and what those players may be. Past experience with a team can also be helpful. In a pregame, discuss who has had the teams before and what they picked up from that previous experience. Who is the key scorer, the key defender, the key substitute, etc. Additionally, know the makeup of the players’ personalities. Is a certain player going to be someone who has a calm head and can be used as an ally or is a player going to be someone who has a hot head and may need more awareness?

Take a situation where a team quickly gets behind, 14-0, and the coach substitutes all five players. Be aware of the psychological makeup of the entire team following that type of substitution. The team may be upset and become increasingly frustrated. No player enjoys being taken out of a game, especially after falling quickly behind. Further, the coach may take the team’s struggles out on the crew. Those are all important context situations for the crew to be aware of and to aid them in carrying out their duties.

A significant substitution situation that crews must pick up on is when a team substitutes out a post player who is not in foul trouble. The team may be trying to pick up the pace of the game, to start running or to start pressing.

Another possibility is the player is a team’s sixth player who is good enough to start but is used as a spark plug off the bench. That can be picked up when you have had a team before.

Others, like former North Carolina coach Dean Smith, played their entire bench in the first half. Coach Smith was believed to have done that to get meaningful experience out of players and to wear the other team down.

Be sure to monitor the beginning and end of the substitution process. Not having the appropriate number of players on the court after a substitution can rear its ugly head for officials. Each crewmember is wise to count the players before resuming play, whether that is a substitution, timeout, quarter break or halftime intermission.

Further, you must know the substitution rules. When a player is replaced, he or she cannot re-enter until the clock has legally started and time has gone off the clock. In order to correctly officiate, know who was subbing in and who the substitutes are.

There is more to awareness than properly judging fouls and violations.

The post No Substitute for Awareness appeared first on Referee.com.

For example, if a player ends the dribble and then fumbles the ball, he or she cannot dribble again. After recovering, he or she has the option to pass or shoot without committing a violation.

During a dribble, A1 inadvertently touches the ball simultaneously with both hands and then fumbles the ball while attempting to catch it. In that situation, A1 can retrieve the ball without violating.

Use patience in fumble situations.

When a closely guarded player ends a dribble and then the ball comes loose, it is important to know whether the loose ball was fumbled or batted by the defender. Remember, because a fumble is not a second dribble by the player, that player may pursue and recover the ball without committing a violation. However, it is illegal to dribble again after recovering the fumble. When a dribble is ended by the opponent’s bat of the ball, unlike a fumble, the dribbler can recover and then start a new dribble without violating.

Use patience in those situations. The NFHS rulebook says that a fumble is the accidental loss of player control when the ball unintentionally drops or slips from a player’s grasp. Wait until the player regains control of the ball and then passes or shoots it before determining if a violation has occurred.

There also are times when a player fumbles the ball while attempting to make a throw-in pass. Violation? Most of the time, no. For example, the official bounces the ball to A1 for a designated-spot throw-in along the endline. A1 mishandles the pass from the official and the ball rolls several feet away. A1 leaves the designated spot to retrieve the ball. Has a violation occurred? In this situation the ball inadvertently got away from A1. The administering official should repeat the throw-in process.

The administering official should blow the whistle as soon as he or she recognizes the ball was mishandled or fumbled, which will cause the ball to become dead immediately. The throw-in should then be re-administered without penalty.

*Article revised Nov. 2022 after rule language clarification* 

The post Travel vs. Fumble — Which is It? appeared first on Referee.com.

A spin move is often used by perimeter players to create separation en route to the basket. Here’s an easy way to identify if a spin move is also a traveling violation because of the pivot foot touching the floor twice.

Contrary to identifying the pivot foot of the player in control of the ball who is making a move to spin past a defender, watch which direction the ballhandler is moving to get around that opponent. If the ballhandler, while facing the basket, spins past the defender to the ballhandler’s right, he or she is pivoting off his or her right foot and, in the majority of cases, bringing the right foot down again to help regain his or her balance after using the left foot to advance toward the basket. If the ballhandler, while facing the basket, spins to his or her left to get around an opponent, he or she will be pivoting off the left foot and likely bring that same foot down to the floor again after using the right foot to get closer to the basket.

Many will argue that it’s nearly impossible to make that move without traveling. If you identify a spin move and see the pivot come down to the floor, it is a traveling violation. If the “swing foot” doesn’t come down, it’s not a traveling violation. Many cases in which a spin move is not a traveling violation occurs when a post player, with his or her back to the basket, makes a move close to the basket and doesn’t bring the swing foot back to the ground.

Don’t rule a spin move as a traveling violation unless you’re positive. In the meantime, watch video of spin moves, especially in slow motion, to better determine and to gain confidence in identifying if it is indeed a traveling violation.

The post How to Keep Your Head From Spinning appeared first on Referee.com.

Some officials are waiting for their peers to fail in applying a certain rule so they can correct them in front of others. Yet when it comes to dealing with players and coaches for breaking rules out on the floor … nothing.

Appeasement seems to be the name of the game. If the coaches, players and fans are happy, the game will go nice and smooth. Forget foul calls on the “stars,” lopsided foul counts for lopsided games, “and ones” and technical fouls. Those are “game interrupters” and will ruin the game.

Here are seven plays that offer an easy way out and a counterpoint. Are you one of the officials choosing the path of least resistance?

The Opening Toss

You are the U1. Team A taps the ball before it’s on its way down.

The Path of Least Resistance: Let the violation go. No need to make the coach of team A upset that early in the game. It wasn’t the best toss by your partner and you certainly don’t want to start the game with a re-toss. That would make your partner look bad. No one ever calls back tosses.

Counterpoint: You have successfully given an unfair advantage to team A. The toss cannot be touched until it is on its way down. All types of infractions can occur on the opening toss. Set the tone early that you are going to get the calls right from the start.

Out Of Bounds

You clearly see the ball go off of team B. It’s likely that a foul on team A caused team B to knock the ball out of bounds.

The Path of Least Resistance: Instead of calling a foul on team A, you are just going to give the ball back to team B.

Counterpoint: Absolute trust in your partners is essential on a play like that one. If there was a foul, trust that your partner(s) will have the call. If they don’t make the foul call, you must call what you see.

Coaching Box

The coach is constantly out on the floor coaching his or her players.

The Path of Least Resistance: Since he or she isn’t yelling at you or your partner(s), no need to issue a warning or technical foul.

Counterpoint: Officials spend too much time coddling coaches. What you may see as a favor for a coach early on in the game will quickly turn into a mess if you don’t take care of the problem early. Safety of the players needs to always remain at the forefront of your thinking on the court. Having a coach on the floor is a huge safety risk not only for the players but for you and your partners as well. Treat it as such.

And One

A player from team A is driving to the basket when a player from team B makes illegal contact with her on her way to the rim. The ball goes in the basket.

The Path of Least Resistance: No call. Let it go. Had the basket not gone in, you would have called a foul.

Counterpoint: I will certainly give it to you that at times, there will be contact made on the arm of a player going in for a basket. Basket goes in. No harm. No foul. However, judging a play strictly on the outcome can become a slippery slope. Set your parameters for fouls early in the game. If a foul on a shot stays within those parameters and the bucket falls, call the foul and count the bucket.

Loose Ball

The ball gets knocked around by several players. A player from team A falls to the ground on top of the ball. A player from team B quickly tries to get the ball away by climbing on top of the player from team A.

The Path of Least Resistance: Held ball. Alternating possession.

Counterpoint: During a loose ball, heightened awareness is vital. Players tend to become overly aggressive and that can’t be tolerated. A loose ball situation does not give players a green light to do whatever they want.

Fouls

Team A runs a very aggressive man-to-man and has five fouls early in the game. Team B is sitting back in a zone defense and has only been called for one foul.

The Path of Least Resistance: You discuss with your partners that maybe you are missing fouls on team B. Anything close, give the benefit of the doubt to team A. Heightened awareness is recommended and before long the fouls are six to five.

Counterpoint: That mentality has to be erased completely. It’s not fair to the game to think that different teams with different plays, offenses, defenses and coaching styles will have the same number of fouls at the end of a game. Don’t go looking for trouble that isn’t there.

Technical Fouls

The game is close. Team B’s captain is constantly complaining about calls even after several warnings, showing blatant disrespect for your judgment and getting more animated by the minute.

The Path of Least Resistance: Continue to talk to the player and give warnings. That is the captain and needs to be kept in the game. You don’t want to have to fill out a report to the state and you certainly don’t want to interrupt the flow of the intense game with a technical foul.

Counterpoint: Emotions are a part of the game. However, when emotions get the best of a player or coach, it’s time for you to take care of business. A sour attitude will make for a sour game.

Game management or manipulation? You be the judge. It is not your place to make your own interpretations and exceptions to rules. It is your job to enforce the rules as written whether the participants of the game like it or not. You are not out there to make people happy. You are out there to make the game better and safer for all involved through your enforcement of the rules.

Challenge yourself so you don’t always choose the path of least resistance.

The post Do You Take The Easy Way Out? appeared first on Referee.com.

I have been telling the people who have worked for me for years that I do not pay them to solve problems; I pay them to prevent them. A problem is inevitably some combination of mess, loss and embarrassment — all things better done without, no matter how elegant the solution. The same thinking applies to officiating, where the wise official misses no opportunity to call upon whatever resources can make things run more smoothly.

In a high school game, one such resource is the visiting scorer. Officially, this person — who usually doubles as the bus driver, or a beloved hanger-on — has no status in the contest. In fact, if the visiting scorer becomes a nuisance, he or she can be asked to sit elsewhere. Having said this, the visiting book (or neutral scorer) can be a tremendous help, never miss a chance to insinuate this person into the mix during a game. Usually, the visiting scorer submits him or herself as a humble servant who has a sincere interest in doing an honest night’s work. If done properly, a positive relationship can be created between the official and visiting scorer which can come in handy as needed.

Establish the visiting scorer as a respectful monitor of the process

You want to establish the visiting scorer as a respectful monitor of the process who is encouraged to speak up if something is amiss; done properly, the visiting scorer can often head off problems by establishing a pattern with the scorer in the striped shirt as the game goes along. This way, any errors are likely to be caught and fixed before they become contentious or untraceable. Most importantly, they can be fixed before the crew needs to get involved.

Make it a point to draw in the two scorers when you enter the floor. Prior to the captain’s meeting, go the table and engage them both in the same conversation. If they seem comfortable with one another, you are headed in the right direction. If they are already showing pictures of each other’s grandchildren, so much the better. If possible, have them sit on the same side of the timer and, ideally, the announcer is seated between them, so everyone’s hearing the same story. When checking the book at least 10 minutes prior to the tipoff, it is best to take the official book over in front of the visiting scorer and have him or her double check the numbers and starters of each team as you read them out. Once you agree (twice a season, or so, you will not initially) then put your initials in the first blank space on both sides of each book, telling them that any names below your initials will be a technical foul. Finally, ask them to let you know at the first opportunity if they have a disagreement. By doing this, you plant in their minds that the official scorer is boss, but they are both important and can help everyone by working together.

As the game goes on, make it a point to drop in on the table once or twice. Ask if the two are still talking to one another, and they usually are. What you want to know, as it comes down to the wire, is if they agree on the score, the foul count of each team, the number and flavor of remaining timeouts and the direction of the possession arrow. Usually, both scorers keep enough timing notes and other doodles that they can reconstruct if a foul is missing or on the wrong person. If your crew has been paying attention, neither scorer can tell you anything truly surprising anyway. If they do, however, and the two just cannot agree on a resolution, you might not automatically go with the official scorer’s word: If your crew or you know something to be different, instruct the official scorer to correct the book. In this context, the visiting scorer can be a source of the supporting “information.” Only as a last resort, when both the crew and the table have already failed, would you go with what is in the official book.

Nine hundred and ninety-seven out of a thousand scorer pairs are perfectly happy with this arrangement. If the other three really want to make life miserable for one another and our crew, make sure your partners know there is trouble at the mill, so all can keep an extra eye on those with the poopy diapers. It may be worthwhile to also let the state office know; maybe they can talk some sense into them.

The bottom line is that the referee and the table must maintain an effective working relationship with one another, and the visiting scorer (or neutral scorer) can help. It is not a master-and-slave relationship, but more like one where you live across the street from the building inspector: Trust — but not too far — and respect each other’s interests.

Use the second book to your advantage to make for an easier game.

The post Use Both Scorers to your Advantage appeared first on Referee.com.

One spring, while observing at Curtis Shaw’s camp in Duncanville, Texas, Natili repeatedly urged campers to look off the ball for illegal activity. He coined the phrase, “Four eyes off the ball,” and credits officials like Shaw, Mike Wood and Karl Hess with helping him develop that skill. Now he is passing it down.

In a three-person crew, we “don’t need six eyes on the ball,” Natili said. “We need four off the ball. There’s a whole other world out there off the ball. You have three officials on the court, so only one-third of those eyes should be following the ball, the other two-thirds should be off.

“Every official has a primary area of coverage and for two of those it’s off the ball. At camps you need to work on these habits. It’s hard to do in-season. It’s like golf — if you want to hit a draw on the course, you have to spend time practicing it.”

During Shaw’s camp, Natili gave officials walking orders to practice: Get an off-the-ball foul every half. That meant they were actively looking at and enforcing coverage in their area. “I don’t care if the calls are marginal,” Natili observed. “It’s a camp. Get in the habit. When it’s December, then it’s part of what you do.”

As an experienced D-I official who has worked deep into the NCAA tournament, Natili is keenly aware of the importance of cleaning up excessive physicality in the college game. Setting a strong example of enforcement and passing down lessons to other officials is an important part of ensuring freedom of movement.

Starts with positioning.

“It’s critical to set up in the right position. Focus on your primary,” he said. From there, keep an eye on cutters and picks. “A vast majority of our calls are on the ball. Everybody in the building can call those.”

Beyond cutters and picks, Natili encouraged officials to watch the shooter as they try to free themselves up. The shooter may get bounced several times while weaving through defenders. That affects the timing of the offense and throws it out of sync. There is then less time on the shot clock to shoot, and the shooter “screws up because we let the excessive contact happen.”

Natili urged campers to focus on the action of knocking shooters off their routes as they weave to set up in an area. He termed that “chucking the cutters,” and said another area to watch and enforce is setting up in post play — being ready for when the ball is received in the post.

Another area is transition. “Rough play starts even as the players are coming down the court,” Natili said. “If three officials are watching over their shoulders in transition, then no one is looking at what’s happening as the players set up on the other end. Rough play starts there.

“Most of the time, it’s the offensive post player who initiates rough contact. He’ll use his rear end or hip to dislodge the defender; then we catch the wrong guy because we haven’t been looking where we should be looking,” he added.

After more than 30 years in D-I men’s basketball, Bryan Kersey has seen his share of “head jerk” whistles, when a partner makes a call on the ball when the official should be looking elsewhere. The primary official on that play jerks his or her head to see why the call was made because the primary official has passed on the ruling.

“Those types of plays — where they’re right in front of you but the whistle comes from your partner across the court — cause problems,” Kersey said. “The coach wants to know why you (as the primary) didn’t make the call because you’re standing right there.

“Before our team goes onto the floor, we discuss making sure all the whistles are coming from the right spots. That ensures a smoother game. If it’s in your primary, you can explain it.”

For younger officials in particular, Kersey advised, “Don’t be a hero and blow your whistle in front of others unless you are 100 percent certain.” Officiating the closest match-up also helps the game go smoother. “Whether you are in the trail, lead or slot, referee the nearest match-up. It’s the easiest thing to look at,” he said.

Kersey encourages his crewmates to anticipate those situations so they are prepared: “Pick those match-ups that are coming toward you so you have whistles in the right areas, and not as the play is moving away from you.”

Same in women’s game.

Division I women’s officials Shannon Feck and Brian Hall agreed that the concept is the same for the women’s game despite court coverage differences. “It’s an important concept, and officials don’t always get it,” Hall said. “In the heat of the moment, it requires discipline to make the call off the ball.”

Hall said he employs self-talk to help him with discipline to keep his eyes off the ball. He’ll call out to himself the players he is responsible for at the exact moment in time and concentrate on them, using the players’ jersey numbers to focus his concentration. How long he will stay with the action in his area “depends on how competitive the match-up is. If one player is on top of another, I’ll stay with it.”

“Know your primaries. If you’re not responsible for action on the ball, you’re off ball. Know what you need to do in each position — lead, trail and center,” he said.

During his pregame, particularly with a less experienced or unfamiliar crews, Hall said he will go over “areas of intersection” on the court, where there can be coverage confusion. That often occurs during transition in the game from offense to defense as the official moves from on-ball to off-ball coverage. “We need two sets of eyes on those intersection (of coverage) plays, for a split second,” Hall explained.

What separates the top officials is their enforcement of off-ball action, according to Hall. “The on-ball stuff is more apparent,” he said. “Know your responsibilities and when you don’t need to be covering the ball.”

Hall compared watching off ball to watching the defender. If you watch the defender, you will be able to see illegal activity by the offensive player as well as the defensive player. The key is to know “why” the action occurred, and that means paying attention to activity within your area of responsibility.

“We teach campers to look off-ball during the summer,” Hall said. “A light bulb goes (on) when you see them get plays right and they’re no longer guessing.”

Feck called “four eyes off the ball” a “universal concept,” applicable to both the women’s and men’s games. On the women’s side, she said there are clear primary areas designated for the crew to officiate.

Off-ball coverage is about being disciplined and strongly officiating competitive match-ups in your primary, not just the “area” itself, Feck said. “If there is not a competitive match-up in your primary, extend to your secondary and find the next competitive match-up that you can actively officiate. Off-ball coverage is about finding competitive matchups in your primary and being ready to come with a whistle in situations where your partners have a closed look,” she said.

Ask yourself, “What is going to hurt me next?” Typical things to look for off-ball include screens (backside, at the elbow, crossing along the endline, etc.), cutters, rough post play and displacement during rebounding, Feck said.

“Enforce freedom of movement by asking yourself if a player’s RSBQ (rhythm, speed, balance, quickness) is affected,” she said. “That can help you determine whether you need to blow your whistle or not.”

Feck, too, emphasized addressing off-the-ball coverage in the pregame, and using self-talk for focus: “I’m always looking for my next matchup, and what type of play could hurt me next,” she said. “Focus on your primary. Help in your secondary. If you referee your primary really hard, you’ll have a really good game.”

Trust your partner.

Four eyes off the ball means trusting your partner. “You have to trust your partner to clean up his area. If your partner has the dribbler, he shouldn’t need your help,” Natili emphasized.

During the pregame, Natili said he discusses the need to clean up illegal contact early, and the game will go “1,000 percent better. The rule changes emphasize cleaning up the illegal contact to increase freedom of movement. It’s an integral part of what the rules committee wants us to do. We need to do our part as officials, and teach this in camp situations.

“Coaches will coach what you allow them to do, use that to their advantage and exploit it so extra physicality remains,” Natili said. “We, as officials, must be committed to cleaning up illegal contact from opening night in December, all the way through the national championship game in April. For real change to occur in our game, it’s incumbent on the high-level guys to referee by example so it trickles down to D-II, D-III and high school.”

The post Four Eyes Off The Ball appeared first on Referee.com.

Knowing clock scenarios is an intangible of proper officiating. It’s a sign of awareness and being detailed, which is a plus with players, fans, administrators and coaches. It shows that you care about the game.

You have to know when the clock starts and stops. Also, you must remember that clock start and stop has nothing to do with the ball live and dead.

Basic principles.

On a jump ball, the game clock starts when the ball is legally touched, but the shot clock starts when a team gains control of the ball. During a throw-in, the game clock starts when the ball is legally touched by a player inbounds. On a missed free throw and the ball is to remain live, the game clock shall start when the ball is legally touched by a player on the floor. The shot clock starts when a player gains control of the missed free throw.

When does the game clock stop?

The game clock stops when the official signals a foul, held ball, violation or timeout. The game clock stops when an official stops the game for an injury. The game clock also stops when the officiating crew confers with the scorer or timer when there is a management situation.

The practical part about the rule is awareness. When an official stops the clock with a signal, he or she must always glance at the game clock and shot clock to know they have properly stopped. The same is true when an official is “chopping” the ball in on a throw-in, jump ball and missed free throw when there is a rebound involved. In that situation, you are making sure the clock and the game clock are properly started. In NCAA, with 59.9 seconds or less remaining in the second half or extra period, the clock is stopped when a field goal is scored. The officiating crew must be aware that the game clock must be stopped.

How do you learn clock awareness?

When going from trail to lead, find the game clock and the shot clock. That is also true when going from center to center and from lead to trail. That establishes a good habit of finding the clocks, which is great for awareness skills. When rotating in the lead position, take a peek at the shot clock and game clock at the far end of the floor. The clocks are in front of you as the center and trail in a rotation.

Know your differentials between the game clock and the shot clock. If the shot clock is improperly reset and you know the difference, do the math and correct the shot clock. That is true in small-college basketball where there are usually no monitors. It’s also true in some high school associations that play with a shot clock. The crew is often accepted very positively when it shows it is in the game and has awareness.

In NFHS games without a shot clock, it helps to know the game time to aid in your credibility when questioned about a 10-second count. For example, if you can say, “Coach the possession started at 4:11 and the clock shows 4:01.” You know for certain that 10 seconds has run off.

Clock awareness is an acquired skill that can be practiced, and once you achieve it you will get noticed as an official that is a student of the game and has skills welcomed by supervisors and assigners.

The post Second Nature appeared first on Referee.com.

Suddenly the post player sets an off-ball screen near the three-point line and the defense decides to switch. At this moment the lead official needs to recognize the unusual match-up. A post player is defending a guard and a guard is defending a post player. Typically, the offensive post player will attempt to use the new match-up to his or her advantage, especially near the basket.

The awareness for this particular match-up will improve your basketball IQ and ultimately will allow you to increase the accuracy of your decision making. Typically, the challenges presented in this type of mismatch are within the post play. Generally, the big-versus-small match-up will not occur on the perimeter because the defense has time to recover quickly. Additionally, when this match-up happens or starts from the perimeter, more times than not the play finishes with a drive to the basket before the mismatch can even develop.

However, when that same little-on-big mismatch is presented in the post area, there is a sense of urgency — regardless of offball or onball given the proximity to the basket. That proximity and sense of urgency leaves opponents wrestling to score via the disadvantage situation.

Any off-ball action typically begins to increase the intensity, so be ready and aware of the offense trying to create a mismatch with its post player(s). When waiting for the ball to arrive in this match-up, it may be too late to make the best decision on any contact.

There is not much opportunity for success with smaller opponents switched on larger opponents, especially near the basket. A lack of understanding puts officials reacting and behind the eight ball.

Here are five options officials must recognize when a big-small mismatch is presented to allow the most informed decision making. 

1) Give up

The smaller defensive player knows there is not a good chance of success and does not want to risk a foul, so he or she will simply give up and let the bigger player score the basket without much pressure.

2) Foul

The outmatched opponent knows he or she will not be able to defend the offensive player successfully, so he or she has to attempt to foul.

3) Attempt to fool

When the defender knows he or she is beat, but does not want to just give up, the defender will attempt to fool the officials into bailing them out of their mismatched situation by flopping. The outmatched opponent hopes the officials will rule a foul and take the bait. In most cases, the player who flops ends up on his or her behind (sitting down) or might even throw the chin back. A true player-control foul has the defender ending up on his or her back.

4) Bull rush

When offensive players know they have a mismatch they will be licking their chops to score, but that does not mean the “big” can plow over or through the smaller disadvantaged opponents.

5) Over the top

When the bigger offensive opponent attempts to shoot over the top or fade away from the smaller opponent, officials should be less likely to rule illegal contact on the jump shot over the top. Avoid being fooled by the offensive player’s lack of aggression to take the easier shot at the basket or posting up the smaller player. Illegal contact that occurs with the shooter’s elbow or arm is a foul though.

Ensure your partners know when these big-small match-ups are occurring during a game. Use pregames, timeouts, quarter/period breaks, intermissions or quick dead balls to make your partners aware. Inform your crew that 15 and 25 is going to be a small-big match-up all game long. Or inform your partners that 10 and 42 seem to be paired up on switches and presenting some challenges for the crew, etc.

The beauty of discussing big-small match-ups is that they occur at every level and in most every game, no matter if you are working youth games or in the NBA.

Here are other differences to keep in mind with the little-on-big matchup. 

Small versus big

You cannot let small beat up big. Sometimes we think the smaller player can do anything to the bigger player. Often we let the small player push the big player around. That forces the bigger player to get physical and often we call the second foul. Watch the small player, too.

Big versus small

Big cannot bully small, but small cannot beat up big, either. Just because the smaller player is physically outmatched does not mean the big player can muscle through. We must recognize the situation and then make the best judgment.

D bigger than O

When the defensive player is bigger than the offensive player, make sure the defender is vertical and does not step through the offensive player. The defender cannot bully the offensive player. Be patient as there could be a good verticality and legal block attempts. Recognize that the smaller offensive player may initiate contact, possibly even throwing themselves, into the bigger defender as a way to fool you into ruling a foul on the defender. Eliminate opportunities to be surprised by recognizing the big-small match-up so that you are not making a decision without all the information.

Rebounding finish

When the big-small situation goes throughout a shot attempt, there is bound to be contact earlier in the shot attempt, especially with the smaller player out farther from the basket than the big. That smaller player will push the offensive player with the hand or dislodge the opponent on the hip. In most situations, watch for the smaller player attempting to put their opponent under the basket before the ball comes off of the ring. One way you can tell that a slight dislodging of a bigger player is a foul is via the bigger player’s body accelerating in an abnormal way.

Differentiation

Another challenge of the big-small match-up is the displacement and dislodging that can occur favoring one side more than the other. With two opponents of equal size, the contact may lean more incidental than illegal. That tends to change quickly when there is a favorable situation for one player. The contact becomes more illegal than incidental because of the displacement and dislodging that occurs.

Tempers play into the situation as well

The officials need to be aware of what is going on and use feel for the situation. Take the situation where the small is now pestering the big because the small knows there is little chance for success unless the small is overly aggressive. Awareness to the potential for illegal contact is needed from the get-go. It is not fair to let all contact go just because one player is smaller than the other. Conversely, because a player is larger does not mean they must take the abuse either.

Whistle timing

There needs to be a difference with your whistle. On-ball action with little on big can be more patient than the off-ball scenario. With off-ball action you have to be immediate. The situation generally will only escalate and offball is more dangerous. Whereas with on-ball action there are more decisions to make and officials can let the play develop and see what happens. How does that play finish? The art of deciding when to whistle an on-ball action in the little-big match-up comes from experience.

The post Big-Small Match-up Awareness   appeared first on Referee.com.

One of the plays discussed during a recent meeting involved a team that has a play. To start the game, two players at halfcourt — one on each sideline — break toward the basket as the official tosses the ball. The team scored on the play the first six of eight games it played. The reason it didn’t on the other two games? Officials called a violation on the players for moving on the tip.

Starting on a bad note can set the tone for a long night.

We know jumpers should be positioned facing the basket farthest from their bench to start the game. Teammates may not occupy adjacent positions around the center restraining circle if an opponent wishes to be in one of those positions. If the opponents do not want the space, it is legal to occupy adjacent positions.

When the official is ready and until the ball is tossed, non-jumpers shall not move onto the center restraining circle or change positions on the restraining circle. Until the tossed ball is touched, non-jumpers shall not have either foot break the plane of the center restraining circle and shall not take a position in any occupied space.

Most any other movement by non-jumpers is legal. For example, a non-jumper can release from the restraining circle after the ball is tossed as long as he or she does not impede an opponent.

Each jumper must have both feet in the half of the circle farthest from his or her basket. Neither jumper shall touch the ball before it reaches its highest point nor leave the restraining circle until the ball has been touched. Jumpers may not catch the ball or touch the ball more than twice.

Jumpers may control the ball if, after the tip, it touches any of the eight non-jumpers.

As for the toss itself, it should be tossed just higher than the players can jump. NFHS rules state that if neither jumper touches the toss the ball “will drop between them.” It should not be touched until it reaches its highest point — not on the way up. If the players swing on the way up and miss it, that is fine; they can still tip the ball on the way down. Don’t blow it dead because they missed the ball on the way up. But quite often, a player will try to tip the ball on its way up to win the tip and that’s a violation.

However, if the ball touches the floor without being touched by at least one of the jumpers, it shall be blown dead and retossed.

The ball becomes live when the ball leaves the official’s hand and the clock starts on the first legal touch or tip.

Non-jumpers may legally leave the restraining circle, break toward the basket and move. That doesn’t always happen, so just because it looks odd doesn’t mean it is illegal.

The jump ball and restrictions end when the touched ball contacts one of the eight non-jumpers, an official, the floor, basket or backboard. That also means the ball is up for grabs by either of the two jumpers as long as the ball touches the floor outside of the restraining circle.

If the ball is touched and goes out of bounds and the officials can’t determine who touched the ball, the official shall re-toss with the original jumpers.

If there is simultaneous control by opponents off the tip, those two opponents shall jump, not the original jumpers.

To keep it simple, remember these three points once you are ready to begin the game with the toss:

Non-jumpers, before the ball is tossed

Non-jumpers can’t do two things: move onto the center circle or change positions on the circle.

Non-jumpers until the ball is touched

Once the ball is tossed, non-jumpers may not do two things: break the plane of the center restraining circle or move into an occupied space.

Jumpers

They must be completely in the circle, not touch the ball on the way up, may not leave the circle, may not touch more than twice or catch the ball unless touched by a non-jumper.

All other activity, including odd-looking plays, is legal.

One last tip. After you blow your whistle to alert the players and scorer’s table, remove it from your mouth before the toss. Officials have lost teeth due to being inadvertently hit during the jump ball.

Keep all of the above in mind and discuss in your pregame to get your games off to a smooth start. You don’t want a coach with a special play on your back the entire night because the coach knew the rule better than you.

The post Start Your Game on the Right Track appeared first on Referee.com.

Levinson credits Edgar Cartotto (longtime Northeast Conference men’s and women’s coordinator, who first hired Levinson into college basketball) and Art McDonald (longtime men’s D-I official) for influencing him when he was a young official and for preparing him to get the block-charge ruling consistently right.

“I wouldn’t have known the rules without Edgar,” Levinson said. “(He and McDonald) were the first two people who talked about refereeing the defender. If you don’t know where the defender is, you can’t make the correct ruling.”

If there is a sudden crash in a block-charge situation that one of his officials misses, Levinson poses a few questions: What were you officiating prior to the situation? Were you ball watching? “You need to anticipate the action, but not what the decision will be,” he emphasized.

Because today’s players are faster, there’s an ever-increasing need to stay focused on the court. “Pick up the defender and be aware of what the offense is trying to do and get in the best position,” Levinson offered.

The play that sends him up a tree is when the defender has established legal guarding position and stays put, and the offensive player moves into the defender. If one of his officials gets that ruling wrong, Levinson delves deeper during his critique: What were you looking at before the play? “I do note ‘WDSDW? — What did she (the player) do wrong?’ — to find out what the official was thinking on the play,” he explained.

Establishing Legality

The first step to prepping for a potential block-charge ruling is establishing legal guarding position for the defender. Think about it: If she has never established legal guarding position, it can never be a charge. To establish a legal guarding position, the defender must have two feet on the playing floor and torso facing the offensive player. There is no minimum or maximum distance or time needed to get into a legal guarding position when the opponent has the ball.

NCAA and the Restricted Area

A caveat in the NCAA men’s and women’s college game is the restricted area. If legal guarding position is established before the defender moves into the arc, the ruling can still be a charge if the player has stayed with the defender or moved backward into the arc while moving to maintain legal guarding position. Otherwise, within the restricted area, the ruling is an automatic block when there is illegal contact — there can still be incidental contact. Legal guarding position cannot be established with the defender in the arc. In NCAAW, if the ballhandler starts his or her move to the basket from within the lower defensive box, then there is no restricted area arc.

Also legal in the men’s college game is verticality in the restricted area. What does that mean?

Let’s take this scenario: The ball is on the perimeter and the dribbler beats his defender going to the hoop. There’s a secondary defender in the restricted area (RA). He establishes legal guarding position. He jumps under the verticality rule — straight up, hands raised directly over his head — absorbing contact. What do you rule?

“It’s OK if he established legal guarding position in the RA and jumps vertically with his arms raised and attempts to block the shot,” Hyland observed.

What the defender can’t do in that situation, according to Hyland, is shift his body into another area. In other words, he can’t jump forward or sideways to cause contact. That becomes a block. It’s dicey. Getting the rule correct on a consistent basis takes a keen eye and knowledge of the nuance in the rules. High school officials: Don’t apply restricted arc rules and philosophies in high school games!

Double-Teaming and Traps

When a teammate comes over to help a primary defender, the block-charge scenario gets a bit more complicated. But the concept is the same: Legal guarding position must be established facing the offensive player. You may see two players assume legal guarding position in a trapping situation. When the offensive player leans in and makes significant enough contact, that’s a charge. “Traps are no free rein to bowl the defender over,” Levinson said.

If the offensive player beats his or her primary, that is the more typical scenario where a secondary defender comes into play. Once the offensive player’s head and shoulders are past the defender, the secondary defender must then assume legal guarding position to draw a charge. The second defender has an obligation to establish a legal guarding position or be called for blocking.

The Shooter

Sometimes basketball officials get excited when a shot goes up. They follow the ball rather than the play. Then they don’t see the shooter come down, where the potential for a block-charge exists.

Correctly officiating the block-charge rule is tough. It’s frequently raised as one of the most difficult decisions for basketball officials. But if you keep the core principles of legal guarding position in mind, you’ll raise your call accuracy.

The post Prep for Bang-Bang Plays appeared first on Referee.com.

Passion’s a fickle thing, however. For some, it’s all they need to rise to the occasion of another season or another assignment to that marquee game everyone covets. Regardless of the outcome, their positive, sunny optimism carries the day. For others, passion makes them their own worst second-guesser; they’re never good enough for themselves and can never savor the trophy fish they caught because they rue the one that got away. The rest of us are somewhere in the middle; refereeing is a spiral staircase of involvement and commitment, and the offseason comes just soon enough to rekindle the fire. The downtime is long enough to pause on the landing and contemplate what it will take to reach the next level, as the flights grow steeper. Take advantage of it.

How can you make the best use of your offseason? I knew a successful official in Canada who kept a notebook, documenting every game he worked. It contained basic details like who played, who he worked with, the score and some game statistics. Most importantly, he also wrote at length about any significant events in his effort to work the game; it was part of his postgame routine to capture these events while they were still fresh in his mind. In this format, the details of any individual game were little more than historical anecdotes. As a litany of the 50-odd games he worked throughout the year, they painted a portrait. He found common threads emerged as opportunities for improvement: If he read about too much dissent, he reconsidered his game management approach. If he made a controversial call and caused a riot, he thought about his process for recognizing certain keys in deciding a foul.

There were three important tenets at work here that you can apply to your basketball career: First, he gave himself some time after the season ended to start missing the sport; we’re often more open-minded once the battle fatigue wears off. Second, he captured his work in terms of cause-and-effect — how the participants responded to him; it didn’t matter how good he thought he was, it was the pattern of results that did … that’s hard for some of us to accept. Finally, he gave himself enough time to do something about anything he discovered. That can be important, for example, if even vertical stripes make you look fat and a weight-loss program is in order. He took his lessons and set about making the following season better; most of the time, it was.

My friend worked in a time when a cell phone hung on the jailhouse wall and a PC was the guy who sent you there. Today, we have many more efficient ways than pen and paper of documenting our roundball progress, and successful officials tend to make the most of them. Certainly, there are plenty of platforms out there like Zooom and Hudl that make it simple enough to get our hands on video of our work; raw footage always tells the truth. We’re likely to see some things about ourselves that we might not have wanted to see — or couldn’t see — during the season.

In my own experience, after a game, I tend to focus on validating that blarge in the fourth quarter that people were chirping about. In the offseason I look at 50 other calls I made like that one and ask myself if I’m closing down properly on the lane and focusing on the defender. If you try it, you might find you nailed the tough one plus the other nine you checked, but then notice something else worth pursuing. Maybe your signals get softer as your arms get heavier or you tend to rush the ball back into the play faster as the game progresses. That’s all good stuff to find out, reflect upon and fix, but you’ll only be able to if you have a process for self-evaluation that is devoid of narcissism.

Be honest to achieve sustainable personal growth

In my real job, I tell people not to settle for the easy answer when solving a problem, to keep digging until all the dots connect. If you just see what you want to see, you won’t improve very much. In officiating you must be prepared to be honest with yourself to expect any sustainable growth.

Of course, there’s another kind of honesty, too: with your partners. Chances are you have some comfort around these people. That makes the offseason a good time to get together with them and go through the review process as a group. If you’ve chosen your crewmates wisely, then you can be frank and vulnerable with one another and start solving group and individual issues successfully.

At the group level, unless the crew meets a lot during the season, bad habits, hybrid mechanics and worse can develop; it then takes a back-to-basics review during the summer to make corrections. On an individual basis, some eye-to-eye sharing — perhaps over a glass or two of truth serum — can resolve issues that have been brewing and affect crew chemistry. Hey, sometimes you might even conclude that the fit just isn’t right for one of you and decide to make a personnel change while there’s still time to find an able replacement.

Basically, the offseason is the time of year to do the right thing in just about any context. It’s the time of year when you’re engaged but not encircled, able to scrutinize while not being scrutinized. It’s a healthy time to make yourself better without it taking up so much time that it becomes the main idea of How I Spent My Summer Vacation. I realize there are many officials who see the time spent refereeing as an avocation which doesn’t/won’t/can’t work outside the dates on the league schedule. That being said, I think Referee consistently conveys this message: Leaving the job at the locker-room door is no longer satisfactory if you plan on moving up, or even if you just want to stay welcome and relevant at your current level. People expect more from us.

It takes sweat equity to succeed. Reserve some of your passion for your downtime and invest in self-improvement. It pays off.

The post Don’t Waste a Chance for Self-Evaluation appeared first on Referee.com.

Ever have any of those thoughts? Be honest. We all have. But what can we learn from those situations? Should we have seen them coming? In most cases, the game will give you “caution signs” if you pay attention. But the overwhelming problem is that officials generally rely on their reactions to get through a game. And even if their reactions are normally good, all it takes is one bad one at the wrong time to blow up the game.

So how do we see the caution signs? Well, first realize that you’re standing in the middle of a minefield! Don’t panic, you can get through this — all you need is to apply some “elevated thinking.” To avoid shrapnel, you need to think your way though a game. “Elevated thinking” is about knowing where the danger lies in officiating.

When you examine why and when we get yelled at, it often boils down to not only making marginal calls, or missing illegal plays, but also includes the circumstances surrounding them. If you know where and when it can be dangerous, you then can raise your awareness to make solid decisions versus relying on just reacting to plays.

We all know that a marginal call can frustrate players, coaches and fans. And the same can be said for when we miss a call that is obvious to everyone. But those situations are not created equal. Some incidents end up being more explosive than others. That realization led Darron George, NCAA D-I men’s official, along with his co-camp director, NBA official Pat Fraher, to run the Elevate Officiating camp (elevateofficiating.com) and to identify four “land mines” of play calling. Let’s examine the minefields in regard to missed or marginal plays.

Marginal Call Land Mine 1: Impact players

Some players are better than others. It’s always been that way, and always will be. They are called impact players because they have an impact on the game, and on their team’s chances of winning. Does that mean they should receive special treatment? No. But you better know where they are. Everyone’s eyes are on the “key match-up.” “Coaches pregame them, announcers analyze them and we better identify them,” George said. “When we call a marginal play against an impact player, that whistle has a consequence. It may cause a substitution, or worse yet, a disqualification. It may mean free throws or points scored. Both of those can severely impact a team’s chances of success, which is why coaches, players and fans go nuts on those plays. The problem is that those situations act as double-edged swords, because if you miss a play, or call a marginal play, for them or against them, there will be a major reaction.”

The point is an elevated awareness is needed. It doesn’t change your judgment, but hopefully will keep you from merely reacting on the plays, and induce you to make a decision instead.

Marginal Call Land Mine 2: Key times

It’s obvious that as time is running out, a bad call (or no-call) can have huge consequences because there won’t be any time for the offended team to overcome it. Those include violations as well as fouls because possessions become increasingly important down the stretch. So when are the key times? “The end of the game is the most obvious, but the same thinking can be applied to the end of the half, end of a quarter and even the end of a shot clock. As time runs down, our awareness should ramp up. It is critical that we make decisions versus reactions at these times,” George said.

Marginal Call Land Mine 3: Lopsided scenarios

Why should we care if things are lopsided? It’s not our job to make things even.

“That’s true, but believe it or not, referees can screw up a 20-point game, too,” George pointed out. “It’s been said that when things are lopsided in a game, ‘One team is playing downhill and the other playing uphill.’ Playing downhill means everything is coming easily to them — they’re cruising. Playing uphill means everything is hard, momentum is tough to come by — they’re struggling. Whether it’s the score, free throws or team fouls that are lopsided, we sometimes insert ‘speed bumps’ into the game in the form of marginal calls or missed plays. Approaching those speed bumps can be dangerous from either direction. We must avoid making marginal calls against the struggling team, and at the same time we must not miss illegal plays against the team that’s cruising. Those two different mistakes tend to act as the ‘straw that broke the camel’s back.’ Let’s be clear: That is not to be confused with calling marginal plays against the team that is up, or letting illegal plays go against the team down. That is not game management; that is game manipulation.”

Marginal Call Land Mine 4: Outside of our primaries

When we decide to make marginal calls from outside of our primaries, we put ourselves, as well as our crew, in danger.

“By doing so, we wreck our own credibility in judgment, and demonstrate that we don’t trust our partner’s judgment as well. We set up the expectation that we will come in from anywhere on any future contested play in the game. On the other hand, when we fail as a crew to call a play that is blatantly obvious to everyone, the whole crew will go down together. Those types of plays cannot be missed by the crew. We can’t simply ‘let our partner live and die with it,’ or think ‘that isn’t my call,’” George said. “Blatant plays need whistles — from somewhere, anywhere.”

You have now been briefed on land mines. Use your head, and good luck.

The post 4 Marginal Call Landmines appeared first on Referee.com.

The game of basketball was founded with the idea of using two people to officiate the game. They would split the court, work as a team and manage their respective areas.  As the players became bigger and faster and the game advanced, three-person mechanics were introduced and are now used at the professional and collegiate levels and at the varsity level in many high schools across the country. The third person on the court allows each official to observe a smaller area. And because more officials are needed, it creates opportunities for younger officials to advance to the varsity level. For those officials working high schools that use two-person mechanics, however, it is critically important they focus all their attention on their primary area throughout the game. Drifting outside your coverage area will lead to missed action on the court and will diminish the continuity between partners.

Crews must work hard at all aspects of their craft in order to maintain the high level of two-person mechanics today’s game requires. Let’s review a few here. The following will help you to cover the court, maintain control of the game and allow you to remain consistent from the tip to the final horn.

Stay in your coverage area

 Each official has specific areas of coverage on the court. For the trail, the primary coverage area consists of the division line to the endline, up to the free-throw lane line on their side of the court. That coverage includes sideline to sideline above the freethrow line extended, and division line responsibility. The lead’s primary coverage area consists of endline to endline, the free-throw lane and their sideline below the free-throw line extended. Consult your officials manual and other publications for additional court coverage study.

What’s important to remember is the focus should be on action within your primary coverage area and not necessarily the ball. By following the ball exclusively, your eyes will take you outside your coverage area and invariably a foul or violation will be missed. To help prevent that from happening, partners must know their coverage area and have complete trust in each other’s ability as an official. Have the confidence in your partner to do the same solid job in his or her coverage area as you will do in yours. That’s the definition of a crew working in tandem. Conducting a solid and thorough pregame will go a long way to building trust and forming that partnership on the court. Start your game with that frame of mind and you will limit the chance of the lead ruling a foul above the freethrow semicircle or the trail whistling a traveling violation near the endline. Those types of long-distance calls will propel the coach up from the bench and make the crew appear out of sync. Keep your attention level exactly where it belongs. Avoid officiating with “four eyes on the ball.”

Switch after fouls

 Switching after fouls is important because it keeps officials alert, on the move and allows coaches to see them working as a crew. After the foul is called, the calling official will observe action from both benches while moving directly to the reporting area. The non-calling official freezes his or her field of vision to observe the action on the court. When a foul occurs in a two-person game, the emphasis must be on observing the action. The areas you are observing during foul reporting are now your primary coverage areas. After a foul, adrenaline levels are high, and perhaps tempers, too. Not maintaining a concentrated focus can result in missing unsporting action on the court or bench area. After reporting, the proper switch is conducted, and play is ready to continue.

Match-ups

 In two person, an official needs to play the percentages and pick which matchups deserve the most attention. Let’s gameplan the high screen and roll (or hedge play) at the top of the arc. It occurs solely in the trail’s primary. But there’s likely four bodies (two offense/ two defense) in a confined space, including an aggressive matchup with the ball. If the on-ball defense is so aggressive, it’s likely difficult for the trail to determine the setup of the screener and the legality of the contact involving any potential hedge defender. It’s just not possible or probable that you can direct your attention as the trail away from the on-ball matchup with pressed coverage. So even if the lead official would have an engaged matchup in the post, isn’t he or she better served to direct their attention toward that high screen and watch that action start, develop and finish? That’s why you have to know how aggressive the defense is involving the on-ball defender. Then direct attention back to any post matchup. The lead plays the percentage, the crew has a better chance to get that important play right and now both can direct their attention elsewhere (trail stays with ball, lead picks up post or screener rolling to the basket).

Of course, there is no substitute for hustle. In a two-person game, officials are running harder and more often. Aspire to be the crew that demonstrates hustle, displays proper court coverage and shows teamwork and trust.

The post The Foundation of a Two-Person Crew appeared first on Referee.com.

These plays can happen in a flash, with the added complication that many times the ball is traveling from outside the ruling official’s primary coverage area, creating a situation where there may be no definite knowledge by that official about who actually last touched the ball before it became dead.

The ruling official, whether responsible for the endline or a sideline, will have one of three possible trains of thought as the ball touches someone or something out of bounds:

• I have definite knowledge about which team last touched the ball and which team should now be awarded a throw-in.
• I am reasonably confident about which team last touched the ball and which team should now be awarded a throw-in.
• I don’t have the faintest idea about which team last touched the ball and which team should now be awarded a throw-in.

The first option is of course the least problematic. The official makes a ruling, everyone in the gym, including Grandma in the top row, agrees and play resumes. No muss, no fuss.
The third option, believe it or not, is also typically an easy one to resolve, so long as it has been addressed in the pregame. In this situation, as soon as the ruling official realizes he or she does not have the necessary information to make an informed ruling, the official should ask for help from the partner best equipped to offer it. The mechanic is simple — blow your whistle, make eye contact with said partner and ask loudly enough to be heard, “Help?” When asked, the partner should make a decision and sell it both verbally and physically by blowing the whistle and loudly proclaiming who should have possession — “Blue!” with an emphatic signal in the direction of the blue team basket.

The verbiage used in the pregame regarding these plays will often go something like this: “If I ask for help, it means I have no idea. Make the call and own it, and as a crew we will accept it, no questions asked.”

It’s the second option of the three listed above that can pose a real-time problem for crews that neglect this particular play during their pregame. Because the last thing you want is an argument between two stubborn crewmates about what they saw and no clean way to resolve it.

Let’s use the following example as a jumping-off point for discussion: A1, standing outside the three-point line near the trail official, zips a pass toward A2 on the low block on the weak side of the floor. The ball is not caught and hits the wall behind the endline. The lead official blows the ball dead and signals a throw-in for team B. However, there is a question about whether B3, standing in the middle of the free-throw lane, actually tipped the ball while it was being passed between teammates.
The pregame discussion by the officiating crew for any play similar to this should operate as follows:

• The ruling official needs to make a preliminary judgment on any out-of-bounds play, unless immediately seeking help and abdicating that choice to a partner, as described earlier in this article.
• Once the ruling official makes a decision, if another official on the floor “thinks” that ruling may be incorrect, it stands as called and there is no need for any type of crew discussion.
• Once the ruling official makes a decision, if another official on the floor “knows” that ruling is incorrect, those two officials should get together, with the ruling official using the new information to correct the ruling.

The key difference is what a crew “thinks” and what a crew “knows.” If an official “thinks” he or she has information that might alter a ruling, that’s not a good enough standard. That information is best left in the official’s mind and has no place coming out of the official’s mouth, where it will only complicate matters, creating a situation where there are now two officials playing the guessing game.

If an official “knows” he or she has information that will create a correct ruling, not only should it be shared, but the ruling official on the play should be willing to accept it and use it to overturn his or her original decision.

The pregame discussion goes like this: “If I think an out-of-bounds ruling is incorrect, I am not saying anything. If I know the ruling is incorrect, I am coming to you with that information and I expect you to use it. Conversely, if you come to me and tell me that you have information that my original ruling is incorrect, I am 100 percent changing my ruling without further discussion.”

If everyone on the crew agrees to these standards before stepping on the court, it eliminates the possibility that two officials will become embroiled in disagreement in real time should one of these plays come to fruition. It puts the entire crew on confident footing, knowing a partner is only going to step into the situation when there is definite knowledge available that will result in a new ruling.

Lead official: “White!”

Center official: Tweet. Tweet. Tweet. “Partner, I’ve got 100 percent knowledge the ball was last touched by white. It should be red ball.”

Lead official: “Red!”

No need for any additional communication on the floor. You and your partners have already done so in the locker room, secure in the knowledge that you are all on the same page.

The post Loose Ball, Tight Talk appeared first on Referee.com.

Find 50 things wrong with this picture; you have one minute.

It isn’t expressly stated in any rulebook, and many officials either forget this or just don’t understand: The referee’s primary job is to run the game. Some of us seem to think that once we’ve met the captains, checked the book and tossed the ball, we just spend the rest of the evening calling the game and hoping things go well: nope. Many assigners specifically designate who they want refereeing a game; it’s the crewmember with the experience, presence, knowledge and common sense to make sure all the things that could go wrong don’t. They want a referee who does something about issues as they arise and heads off the rest before they do.

Two potential trouble spots are the help at the scorer’s table and the aforementioned townsfolk — the parents, students, cleaners, cops and — yes — even the guy burning the burgers. If any of these principalities gets out of hand, things will go someplace you don’t want. As the referee, you have it in your hands to keep it from getting that far and should be using the game administrator to help. Here’s how it works.

In a perfect world, the timer and scorer pass the night in anonymity, mirthfully cooperating and successfully reading your mind at every turn. Meanwhile, the rabble is too busy watching the game to bother with you; even if they don’t love your work, they at least express themselves in a way that wouldn’t ruffle the monsignor, were he in attendance. In the real world, neither of these always happens.

When you walk into the building, the first face you want to see is the game administrator. This is the person the school appointed to maintain order, which includes helping you maintain order. Get him or her on your side before there’s anything to do, yet. Build a rapport; if you know each other — great! (Re)secure their agreement that if you need help with an issue they’ll be there to assist and do everything necessary to deal with trouble. Usually, that’s enough, as most admins take their job seriously; they might get busy doing other things, but they’ll tilt their ear toward the gym and make a timely reappearance when the shrieks start getting louder.

Others, however, seem to take glee in your sorrows. You’ll pick that up from them quickly (or know ahead of time) and you should plan accordingly. In these cases, you’ll need to replace, “Please look after it, when I need help” with “When I need help, I’ll hold up the game until you can get it taken care of.” Mildly confrontational, I agree, but you’ve made an absolute statement in front of two or three witnesses; it leaves that person with few options for evasion unless he or she happens to enjoy phone calls from the state office. The school may have hired you for the game at its leisure, but when the game starts, the game administrator should be serving at yours.

Generally, you want the admin to help with any issue not among your direct duties. Don’t address fans, silence the band or censor the cheerleaders yourself; let the game administrator do it. Let the admin handle spectator, utility, software, hardware and culinary issues as he or she sees fit. If the admin is successful, great! If not, be prepared to draw a line in the sand: “Sorry, I asked you to remove this person.” “When I asked you to get someone to keep the lane dry, I really meant it; I’ll wait.”

Once you’ve picked your battle, the only option you and the admin have is to follow through until it’s won. Sociologists say that fans go by the actions of the coach, and this stretches to the administrator if he or she seems to be getting away with blowing you off. Don’t let that happen, even if it means planning on never coming back because of it.

The table is another story. These people are often loyal servants and the same faces you’ve been looking forward to seeing for the past 15 years. They’re never a problem and things go wonderfully. In other cases, you might still know them well, but they’re as trustworthy as a butcher with bills to pay and a lead finger: The timer always remembers to forget starting the clock when the chips are down. The scorer mistakes the captain for a benchwarmer when it’s her fourth foul. They both greet every signal you make with ones of their own. Keep ahead of them.

On my own crew, the three of us divide monitoring responsibilities at every stoppage. While one of us is reporting a foul or managing the restart, a second is watching the players and the third is auditing the table by checking the scoreboard; he’s making sure it reflects what just transpired. Malevolent tables need to be watched like a hawk. Inexperienced or overwhelmed ones merit the same. Good ones should get your attention simply because they appreciate it. Never let your only heir pack your parachute and never abdicate the accounting of the game totally to the table, no matter who they are. If they’re struggling, see about getting the admin to coach them a bit. If they’re truly up to no good, make a choice: Do you want to look bad getting the AD to replace them or look bad letting the game-winning shot be made by a kid with five fouls? Hint: Remember why you were given the job.

As the referee, you can have the building cleared if that’s what it takes; if your control is really that weak, though, someone will have burned it down before you get the chance. Instead, commit to these behaviors: Be proactive and affirmative for the duration of your visit, but only be assertive when you aren’t getting the help you need.

If you and your crewmates project a professional image, it might still be the three of you against 3,000 opponents some nights … but it will still be about even.

The post A Helping Hand With Flaming Fans appeared first on Referee.com.

However, he likely never saw the day when he would be compared to a prison warden. He has the unique environment of the 2021 NCAA Tournament to thank for it.

With leisure-time options limited for the 58 men’s basketball officials who found themselves confined to an Indianapolis bubble due to ongoing COVID-19 concerns and restrictions, the NCAA had to get creative to keep its tournament arbiters from going stir crazy. The decision was made to lease Victory Field — the home ballpark for the Triple-A Indianapolis Indians minor league baseball team — for four one-hour periods. The idea was to allow the officials to break up the monotony of Netflix binge sessions in their hotel rooms with some fresh air and exercise.

Never had tossing around a football, playing a few games of cornhole or enjoying a simple walk on fresh-cut grass felt so good. And when the moment came each time for the group to load back onto a bus and return to their bubble accommodations, Collins got an earful.
“All 58 of our officials would boo me in unison,” he said with a laugh. “We got time in the yard. We really enjoyed just getting that freedom more than anything. It gave us a boost.”

On one hand, it might seem hard to believe that a group of men and women chosen to work on the biggest stage afforded by their chosen avocation would need any type of psychological or physical intervention or enhancement. To have one’s name on the list of officials selected for the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments would, under normal circumstances, be more than enough adrenaline to fuel their own personal March Madness.

However, the madness manifested itself in a much different form in 2021. Coming on the heels of an unprecedented conclusion to the 2019-20 season when the COVID-19 pandemic caused the cancellation of all the NCAA’s national basketball tournaments, the return to postseason basketball was still anything but normal one year later. For tournament play to safely return, changes were going to be necessary.

The first domino came with the NCAA’s decision to hold both of its Division I tournaments at a single “location” rather than utilizing regional sites throughout the country that eventually winnowed down into a traditional Final Four city. The men’s tournament would ostensibly be held in Indianapolis, while using arenas throughout the Hoosier State, from West Lafayette in the northwest and Bloomington to the south, for early round games. The women’s tournament featured a similar approach, with San Antonio serving as the host, and nearby arenas in Austin and San Marcos also serving as de facto regional locations.

That decision meant Collins and Penny Davis, his counterpart in the NCAA women’s national coordinator role, needed to adjust their approach to staffing the games. In a normal year, each would reward approximately 100 officials with tournament assignments, such large numbers necessary as crews were needed in eight different regional locations spread across four time zones and thousands of miles. Upon the completion of each round of tournament play that number would shrink, until eventually a crew of 10 officials got the call to report to whatever city was hosting the Final Four, the pinnacle of each respective tournament.

The geography of the 2021 postseason, coupled with the NCAA’s desire to create an officiating bubble that would allow for tighter control and monitoring, and reduced exposure to the ills caused by COVID-19, made such a large number of officials not only unnecessary, but unwise. After consulting with NCAA staff, both Davis and Collins made the decision to invite a streamlined pool of 60 officials to work this year’s events.
“We had obviously a lot of challenges in front of us that complicated things,” said Davis, who in two years as the national coordinator has yet to have a normal tournament experience due to the pandemic. “We were kind of getting to sort of establish things for what we were doing because everything was brand new. There was no mold. … Certainly, there were a lot of good officials who weren’t selected that would have been in our typical pool.”

“At the time, you don’t know if it’s the right number,” Collins said. “At this particular time, in this year with COVID, it was exactly the right thing to do.”

Those 120 officials faced stiff restrictions before even stepping on the floor at their tournament sites. Upon arrival in either Indianapolis or San Antonio, they were required to take initial COVID-19 tests and quarantine in their hotel rooms, unable to even venture to the hotel pool, gym or lobby until receiving clearance from local health officials and the NCAA. Once the officials cleared initial quarantines, they still had to endure daily virus testing for the entirety of their tournament experience, were forced to change into and out of their uniforms at their hotels instead of on-site locker rooms, had to ride in approved shuttle buses to and from the arena, and could not even stick around following their own games to watch their fellow officials work games.

Almost immediately, a serious complication arose on the men’s side. Upon arriving Sunday, March 14, at the Le Meridien hotel in downtown Indianapolis, a group of six officials discovered their rooms were not quite ready and headed to Harry & Izzy’s, a nearby steakhouse, for an impromptu dinner. Upon their return to the hotel, at approximately 10 p.m., they were given a COVID-19 test and placed into quarantine, same as the other 54 officials.

One of the six was tournament fixture Roger Ayers, who had been invited to work March Madness every year since 2006. When he got to his room he placed his cell phone in “Do Not Disturb” mode and went to sleep. He awoke Monday morning to find he had three missed calls, all from an Indianapolis area code. His test had come back positive for COVID-19, and a second test was going to be required.

“They sent two nurses to my room. They were dressed in space suits. It was like I had the plague,” said Ayers, who earlier on Sunday had worked the championship game of the Atlantic 10 Tournament between VCU and St. Bonaventure at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y. “I really thought, ‘This is a false positive.’”

About 90 minutes later, he discovered it wasn’t. Another phone call. The second test was also positive.

“I told the lady when she called the second time, ‘You get me a Starbucks and I can ref this morning,’” Ayers said.

Not only was that not going to be the case, he was being removed from the tournament under orders by Indiana state health officials. And to make matters worse, his five dining companions — John Gaffney, John Higgins, Kip Kissinger, Ray Natili and Ted Valentine — were also knocked out of the tournament due to contact tracing protocols.

Meanwhile, Ayers had to figure out how to deal with the immediate aftermath. The first order of business was sharing the information with those who needed to know.

“I had to make two hard calls that morning,” he said. “Obviously, I had to call J.D. Collins. There was immediate silence. And then he said something I’ll never forget. He said, ‘We’re going to take care of you.’ It took a huge burden off of me.
“The second hard call I had to make was to call those five guys.”

Once that was finished, and not showing any symptoms, Ayers had to try to convince health officials to let him travel to his home in Roanoke, Va., rather than suffer through a 10- to 14-day quarantine in his hotel room. With the help of Collins and the NCAA staff, he was able to secure a rental car and made the eight-hour drive home.

“The whole way home I felt fine. No symptoms. Tuesday night about 2 a.m., I woke up soaked in sweat and I couldn’t swallow,” Ayers said. “I said, ‘Uh-oh. This is the start of it.’ I steadily went downhill from there.”

He called his doctor Wednesday. On Thursday afternoon, he started having breathing issues. He went to a local hospital and went through a battery of X-rays and scans on his chest.

“That was probably the scariest part of this whole ordeal. I thought I would be reffing (Thursday), and instead I’m staring at a ceiling and wondering if I’m going to be OK,” Ayers said.

He convinced the doctors to not admit him to the hospital, returning home and enduring four days where he could barely get out of bed and walk to the kitchen to grab a Gatorade from the fridge. After about two weeks, he was able to take short walks in his neighborhood. Slowly but surely, he regained his physical health and now feels 100 percent.

Mentally, however, it’s been a tough couple of months as he struggles with guilt over what his positive test cost his dining companions.

“To know I had an influence on those guys not working, and it was not their fault, mentally, that’s been the toughest part of this whole thing,” Ayers said.

While Ayers’ health issue provided a troublesome start to the 2021 tourney on an officiating front, it was another tourney veteran, Bert Smith, who became the center of attention just two weeks later. College basketball fans and officials everywhere watched in horror as the Florence, Ky., resident collapsed to the floor approximately four minutes into the Elite Eight contest between USC and Gonzaga on March 30.

In real time, not much information was available, with CBS, which was broadcasting the game, cutting to a commercial. When the broadcast resumed, replays showed Smith pulling down his mask for a couple of possessions earlier in the game, apparently struggling to catch his breath, before a full-court view showed him dropping to the floor, unconscious on his feet.

“I didn’t have any signs or anything that said, ‘You’re not feeling well,’” said Smith, who went through his regular pregame routine and even sprinted back to the Lucas Oil Stadium locker room with crewmate Randy McCall just minutes before tipoff. “I remember starting to struggle, but the four minutes prior to that it was a normal game for me. I didn’t have any triggers that I was experiencing any problems at all.”

Once Smith came to, he was ready to resume the game with partners McCall and Doug Shows. The on-site medical personnel had other ideas. They asked Smith if he could sit up, and that’s when he noticed the stretcher that had been wheeled onto the court.
“And I look and I go, ‘What’s that for?’” he said with a laugh.

The doctors convinced Smith to sit on the stretcher for just a moment. Then they convinced him to swing his legs up onto it. At that point, Smith was strapped in and taken off the court, with a now indelible image of him on the stretcher, arms crossed, a scowl etched across his face.

“I just had all the emotions. So I’m just sort of frustrated, mad and not knowing what the heck’s going on,” Smith said.

Early speculation was Smith had been dehydrated. He was taken into the locker room and examined for a possible concussion — his head having struck the floor with plenty of force when he fell. Once the game was over, he returned to the hotel with McCall and Shows, who tried to convince him to visit the hospital and get checked out. Their appeals were finally heard, and after a shower at the J.W. Marriott hotel to freshen up, Smith went to IU Methodist Hospital.

At first, everything checked out. Smith’s vitals were normal and his brain was clear. However, a persistent emergency room physician had one lingering question.

“She just looked at me and she goes, ‘Something doesn’t add up. I want to know why you fell.’”

After a battery of tests, they had the answer, and it was much more worrisome than dehydration. Smith had a blood clot in his right lung, also known as a pulmonary embolism.

“I let my wife know. That was an emotional conversation,” Smith said. “I let J.D. (Collins) know. That was also an emotional conversation.”

According to Smith, his doctors don’t fully understand why the clot emerged, as he did not exhibit any of the telltale behaviors or symptoms that typically lead to a clot. They believe it began in his legs and traveled to his lung, and at some point lodged in a position that inhibited his oxygen intake, leading to his blackout and fall.

“What happened to me on the court was going to happen to me somewhere again, and maybe I don’t recover,” Smith said. “You go on Google and pop ‘pulmonary embolism’ in there, and you spend 10-15 minutes reading about it, and you sort of go, ‘Whoa!’
“Every one of us should value each day and not take it for granted.”

While the Ayers and Smith incidents both received the lion’s share of headlines regarding officiating during this year’s tournaments, plenty of additional personal storylines developed over the three weeks of March Madness competition, with each of the 118 officials who ultimately worked a tourney game emerging with a tale to tell.

Take the case of Fatou Cissoko-Stephens, who was no stranger to the bubble environment and the challenges it posed. Last summer, during her sixth season as a WNBA official, the Providence, R.I., resident found herself inside that league’s bubble at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla.

The 11 nights she spent in the NCAA women’s tournament bubble in San Antonio as she advanced to the Sweet 16 was nothing compared to the 68 days she endured in the WNBA version.

“It definitely prepared me, because going into the WNBA bubble, I brought everything,” Cissoko-Stephens said. “I brought so much stuff, like I was going to camp. I wanted to make sure that I kept myself and everybody happy.”

Cissoko-Stephens streamlined the process in San Antonio, but it doesn’t mean she arrived without an array of creature comforts. Having experienced laundry issues in the WNBA bubble, she used FedEx to ship a mini washer and dryer setup to her hotel room in Texas. The music lover also brought along her turntables and speakers, serving as the unofficial DJ for the women’s officiating staff.

“A lot of times it’s preparation. You have to prepare for anything in life. If you do that, you can be successful,” Cissoko-Stephens said. “I knew I needed clean clothes, I knew I needed DJ equipment and I knew I needed snacks. That’s what I shipped down to be comfortable, to feel like home.

“We had a hallway dance party, and everyone was like, great, we can hear music, we can dance, we can live. It was almost like college-wise, you’re going back to a college atmosphere.”

Chuck Gonzalez didn’t necessarily need the dance steps. He was already getting plenty of physical exertion, and it had nothing to do with the number of tournament games he worked, culminating with the Women’s Final Four semifinal clash between Arizona and UConn.

When the 31-year NCAA veteran from Huntington Beach, Calif., checked into the officials’ first hotel, the Holiday Inn in San Antonio, he was assigned to the very last room on the ninth floor, farthest away from the stairs. That’s an important detail considering that, until all of the officials cleared quarantine procedures, none of them were allowed to use the hotel elevators.

“It was 162 steps, and I was doing it nine times a day,” said Gonzalez, who had to make the trek for each of his meals and to do his COVID testing. “I was walking the Empire State Building every day.”

When he wasn’t busy putting one foot in front of the other, he was employing a variety of techniques to pass the time.

“I took more naps than I probably ever have in my life. My iPad was plugged into the TV and I was binge-watching Netflix. I did a lot of sit-ups,” he said.

“And for those of us who drink, Drizly became your best friend.”

In fact, the online liquor store led to an amusing interaction between Gonzalez and his tournament boss. Crossing paths with Davis in the hotel lobby, he mentioned he was waiting on a food delivery — only to be busted when the delivery driver showed up with something a little bit stronger.

“I felt so guilty,” said Gonzalez with a laugh. “I went by Penny and I felt like a little kid, like I was caught. I told her, ‘I’m sorry I lied to you.’ She was like, ‘Drizly? I’ve already done it.’”

Men’s official Courtney Green caught a break that allowed him to not be held captive to the online overlords. And it was especially welcome given his own personal officiating schedule. As one of several officials who worked the Big Ten Tournament prior to the NCAA version, he got a double dose of the Indianapolis officiating bubble.

Had Green been selected to work the Big Ten title game, he would have had no choice but to remain in Indy following that game Sunday afternoon and immediately enter the NCAA bubble. Instead, he worked one of the two Saturday semifinals, allowing for a quick 24-hour getaway to his Columbus, Ohio, home.

“Any chance you get the ability to go home, even if it’s for a couple of hours, is worth it,” said Green, singing the refrain of a busy sports official.

Doing so allowed him to stock up on provisions — avoiding some online supply ordering — and enjoy a one-night respite from a hotel bed before he returned to tournament central for a 16-night stay that culminated with his first Sweet 16 assignment.

Reaching a new personal milestone on college basketball’s biggest stage allowed Green, an 11-year D-I veteran, to put a positive spin on an otherwise challenging situation.
“It’s obviously an awesome experience to be selected into the NCAA Tournament,” he said. “You start realizing that there were only 60 guys here. So I had multiple feelings. Once I got there and realized just the magnitude of what we were getting into, it changes the whole scope.”

Now that everyone is months removed from perhaps the most unique NCAA Tournaments ever, a few unifying themes remain.

There is gratitude for good health, with Ayers and Smith having rounded back into shape, and the knowledge that in the midst of a pandemic, tournament games were played and champions were crowned.

There is thankfulness for the camaraderie created by having officials sheltered together for weeks at a time instead of spread throughout the country, sharing the uncommon bond of having thrived despite the harsh restrictions of the bubble environment.
And there is hope that none will ever have to experience NCAA Tournaments like these again.

“There was nothing normal about 2021,” Collins said. “We all look forward to and desire a normal year, whatever that’s going to be.”

The post A Look Back at March Madness In A Bubble appeared first on Referee.com.

Sometimes a coach might immediately question the merits of your call. The last opportunity you have to head off any of his or her doubt is during the report to the table. Make the report strong and often coaches will give you less pushback on the call.

For example, when signaling a holding foul to the table, make sure to use the appropriate signal. In some cases officials will extend one arm parallel to the ground and grab it with the other hand. Instead, hold one arm up in the air and grab the upward arm, as shown in the PlayPic.

You can project further strength when signaling a hold by moving the upward arm out to complete the signal. Consider making the signal from about the height of your shoulders to project strength and believability in the call.

If you make the report without confidence and strength, you will quickly open the door to pushback by a doubting coach.

The post Strong Signals Can Defuse appeared first on Referee.com.

Fundamentals.

To judge traveling accurately, you need to see both the ball and the feet. Consider the uncontested layup, for example. The player will leap and catch the ball with both feet off the floor. One foot then lands and the player takes a long stride, landing on the opposite foot, and leaps for the layup: a rhythmic one-two sequence. The first foot to hit the floor is the pivot foot, which can be lifted legally before releasing the ball on a try.

Now consider the case in which the player catches the ball to end the dribble with one foot on the floor. That foot is the pivot foot and cannot be returned to the floor before the ball is released. In that case, the normal one-two rhythm described above is illegal. The key element is the position of the feet at the instant the player catches the ball to end the dribble.

Situations.

The Eurostep is a favorite move these days. It occurs when a player ending a dribble steps at an angle to one side of the straight path of his or her dribble, followed by a leap off that foot to the other side of that straight path, landing on the opposite foot and normally rising for a try (or a pass). If one foot is on the floor when the player catches the ball, it is a traveling violation when that foot returns to the floor.

The spin move is also popular. Focus on the foot that corresponds to the direction of the player’s spin to see if it returns to the floor before the ball is released. For example, if a player spins to the left, focus on the left foot. Often the pivot foot must be replanted to gain the balance needed to rise for the try.

Find the place where you can see the feet

To complicate matters a little more, in the midst of the spin it is also possible for the player to catch the ball with both feet off the floor. He or she may then legally use the one-two sequence described above. If both feet land simultaneously, or if both feet are on the floor at the end of his dribble, he or she may step with either foot, lift the other (the pivot) and rise for the shot legally.

A player might use a crossover move at the end of the spin provided that the restrictions on movement of the pivot foot are met. For example, the player could legally step with his or her left foot as the player completes the pivot, push off that foot to step back to the right with his or her left foot, leap to shoot or pass.

The jump stop.

The rules provide one situation where a player may lift his or her pivot foot and return it to the floor without penalty. A player who is moving may catch the ball with one foot on the floor, or land on one foot if airborne, and leap off that foot to land on both feet simultaneously. The player may not pivot thereafter, but may rise to shoot or pass. If the player has not yet dribbled, he or she must release the ball to the floor before either foot leaves the floor.

The key point is that both feet must land simultaneously. The feet do not have to be the same distance from the basket and there is no limitation on the distance covered in the leap. However, if a player leaps off one foot, lands on the other, and then the first foot returns to the floor, it is a traveling violation. The officials have just a split second to determine whether the foot action is legal, particularly if the player goes on to leap off the pivot foot for a try.

Practical guide.

Find the place where you can see the location of the feet at the instant the dribbler catches the ball. If either foot is on the floor at that moment, it cannot be lifted and returned to the floor before the ball is released. If both feet are off the floor at that time, the one-two and rise action of the uncontested layup sequence is legal.

The post Focus on the Feet to Get Traveling Rulings Right appeared first on Referee.com.

The crowd goes crazy and so do you! Why? The horn to end the game has yet to sound. So what do you do now? You must be aware of the clock at all times. You must see the clock start when the ball is legally touched on the floor. No excuses! You just officiated a great game. No one will remember the previous 1,917 seconds in your high school game or the previous 2,397 seconds in your college game if there is an issue at the end of the game. Timing errors are always credited to the officials, not the timer.

The question becomes, how do you avoid those mishaps in your game? Unfortunately, there will always be mistakes when dealing with varying table crews.

You may have the teenage scorekeeper who cannot stop texting long enough to write down the score, or the scorekeeper who records the foul before you even report it. How about the clock operator who is too busy coaching to start the clock? There is always the mom or dad the coach pulled out of the stands because no one else was available. First-time timers may start the clock as soon as you hand the ball to the inbounder.

Regardless of the experience level of your table crew, you are responsible for their mistakes. Your goal is to minimize the impact that a table error can have on your game. Table management and clock awareness go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other. The three keys to good table management and clock awareness are: preparation, information and communication.

Preparation

Preparation begins with three assumptions:

1. Assume that your table crew will be inexperienced.
2. Assume that your table crew will make mistakes.
3. Assume that your fellow officials will not catch them.

By assuming the worst, you can expect the best from yourself.

The best officials are prepared by knowing the rules. Get out your rulebook and study the following for NFHS and NCAA games: correctable errors, foul administration, scoring and timing regulations, live-ball/dead-ball, alternating possession, timeouts and technical fouls. In addition, college (and some high school) officials need to know the rules governing the use of a court-side monitor and the shot clock.

Upon arriving at the game site, locate the game clocks and the shot clocks if appropriate. If you have a college game with the use of a court-side monitor, inspect that as well. Allow sufficient time to meet with the scorer and timer. You should report to the table at least two minutes prior to the 10-minute mark to avoid having to start the game with a technical foul. Prepare an information sheet for the table crew that it can refer to and keep.

Information

The information you provide to the table will need to be tailored to the level of basketball you are officiating. However, universally you must remind the table you are the same team as they are. The officiating crew and the table crew must work together to ensure the fairness and integrity of the game. It doesn’t matter what school they are affiliated with. On that day they are a member of the officiating team. Politely introduce yourself. Be sure to ask the scorer and timer if they have any questions for you. When working with a veteran table crew you must be tactful in your approach. Always ask them how they handle certain situations.

Communication 

You’ve heard it before but communication is imperative in establishing good table management and clock-awareness skills. You must have good communication with your fellow officials, table and coaches in order to avoid correctable errors as well as uncorrectable errors.

Communication starts with a thorough pregame conference. The following topics should be covered: clock awareness, last-shot responsibility, eye contact, free-throw confirmation, fouls/bonus, disqualifications, timeouts, warnings on teams and coaches, technical fouls, throw-ins, team control, substitutes and correctable errors. For example, over-emphasize the importance of making eye contact with your partners and counting players before administering the ball to an inbounder. It is possible that your table allowed a sub to enter the game without reporting.

Don’t rely on the table for accuracy with the alternating-possession arrow. There are several ways to remember. Some officials keep a coin or a whistle in their pocket and switch it after every held ball. Others repeat the color of the team in order to remember. It doesn’t matter how you do it, just do it.

Be cognizant of your surroundings. A couple of seconds accidentally ticking off the clock may not seem like a big deal in the second quarter but those same seconds could mean the difference between a win and a loss for a team in the end. It’s the little things, such as clock awareness, that will carry you to the next level.

The post Prevent Timing Errors appeared first on Referee.com.

Ask yourself what “on the floor” means regarding the rules of continuous motion. You may be surprised to learn that the common practice to use such a phrase, “on the floor,” is not supported by rule. In fact, it contradicts the rules relating to continuous motion.

Continuous motion is defined in NFHS rule 4-11 as follows:

Art 1: Continuous motion applies to a try or tap for field goals and free throws, but it has no significance unless there is a foul by any defensive player during the interval which begins when the habitual throwing movement starts a try or with the touching on a tap and ends when the ball is clearly in flight.

Art 2: If an opponent fouls after a player has started a try for goal, he or she is permitted to complete the customary arm movement, and if pivoting or stepping when fouled, may complete the usual foot or body movement in any activity while holding the ball. These privileges are granted only when the usual throwing motion has started before the foul occurs and before the ball is in flight.

Art 3: Continuous motion does not apply if a teammate fouls after a player has started a try for goal and before the ball is in flight. The ball becomes dead immediately.

In other words, the true determining factor in ruling to award free throws or not is what the player is doing at the time of the foul. The player is doing one of three things: dribbling, passing or shooting.

It is easiest when the player is dribbling while being fouled. In that case, the player can’t be awarded free throws, as they haven’t started a try.

Once you determine the player has ended his or her dribble, that player is either attempting to pass or shot. When fouled you need to judge which of the two the player was doing.

If you can’t determine that the player is passing the ball, how can we know that the player wasn’t attempting to shoot? The ball does not need to be in flight for the proper awarding of continuous motion and free throws. Many fouls are made by players who are fouling to deny the player from getting the shot attempt off.

Remember the definition for when a try begins in 4-41-3: The try starts when the player begins the motion which habitually precedes the release of the ball.

Have a patient whistle and see the play all the way through

Therefore a player can indeed, by rule, begin a shot while still on the floor. In fact, every shooting motion, with the exception of an alley-oop or put-back, starts with the player on the floor. Officials cannot just assume that a player has not started their shooting motion just because the player was on the ground when they were fouled.

It may help for officials to have a half-second more patient whistle. Doing so allows for the play to go through the entire sequence. See the entire play through the start, develop and finish phases. When we make calls a split-second after a foul occurs we are only seeing the play through the develop phase. That is the reason why officials commonly make the mistake of putting the ball back in play for an inbound situation as opposed to having the restart be on the free-throw line for a shooting foul.

Seeing the finish phase of the play allows you to know exactly what the player was doing. Was that player actually starting his or her shooting motion?

Knowing the entire part of the rules helps us get those plays right more times than not. Ensure that we are not rewarding the defense just because they commit a foul early in the player’s shooting motion. Any time the offensive player is starting his or her normal movement to shoot, jump for a lay-up, make a post move they are in the act.

If the player is on the floor in that beginning motion, he or she is still in the act of shooting regardless if the ball is released or not.

Get those types of plays right. Work to eliminate the phrase “on the floor” and help others understand the misconception.

If you are ruling the player hasn’t started his or her motion when fouled, consider saying “no shot” or “before the shot.”

The player is either in the act of shooting or not. Have a patient whistle and see the play all the way through the finish phase. The floor has zero effect on if a player is shooting or not.

The post Have Patience Considering Continuous Motion appeared first on Referee.com.

1. Monitoring defensive players as they close hard on a jump shooter.
2. Officiating the screen in your primary area to free the three-point shooter.
3. Watching for illegal contact while a defensive player contests a jump shot.

Understanding those differences in coverage earlier helps increase play-calling percentages. Officials must also be aware of long rebounds from missed jump shots and position themselves accordingly.

As the number of long-range attempts are increasing, officials need to adjust position in covering the three-point shot as this is critical to be able to “referee the defender,” or risk being right behind the offensive player. It is crucial to position-adjust earlier, before the ball arrives in the shooter’s hand. When the adjustment is on the catch, the official is late and at that point the official can only mark a three-point shot. If you make your position-adjust earlier, you can identify if there is a screening situation in your primary area and how hard the defender is closing. If you make a correct position-adjust, you can then judge the legality of the screen and also referee what that defender is doing.

If the defender is closing hard, you must stay with the defender the whole time, while also staying with the offensive player. You must realize that when the defender is closing hard, the shooter is probably up in the air already — they are closing hard because they are late. The defender has a tendency of going right into the offensive player’s body as they are coming down and the shooter is not allowed to land.

If you do not make your position-adjust, then you have no open angle to correctly judge the play and end up guessing. Some people say, “Well, if I did not do a position-adjust to referee the defender who is closing fast, I am for sure going to see that they got undercut because they will both be on the floor.” Not necessarily, as you would not be able to see, for example, if the offensive player makes an unnatural move and kicks his or her foot out to try to draw a foul.

You must be able to officiate the defensive player. If you understand and practice that, you have a chance to get the rest of the story. You will be able to officiate the offense and the defense all the way up and down and bring that player legally to the floor.

Finishing the play

It takes time to make the change in coverage of three-point attempts. A lot happens to the ball while the covering official is ensuring the shooter gets back to the floor. After the ball is shot and is on its way to the basket, fouls occur during rebounding situations in one of three areas:

1. While the ball is on its way to the basket.
2. As the ball is coming off the ring.
3. After the rebound is secured.

While the ball heads to the basket, players are starting to move, hold, get position, etc.

As the covering official, you are staying with the shooter and the defender. The other two officials must extend their coverage until the covering official is able to pick up the rebounding action.

With an increase in three-point shots, officials have to referee the defender, watch the screen in your primary area, bring the offensive player up and down, and watch how it impacts rebounding coverage.

Use video in your pregame meetings to review coverage on three-point shooters.

The post Cue on Defender to Officiate 3-Pointers appeared first on Referee.com.

What helps an official to excel in that area? First and foremost, you must be an official who promotes trust and communication among your crew regardless of your position or status among a particular staff. Those are two of the biggest factors in successful team officiating. You will continue to see those two words appear over and over again. As the referee, you should look for opportunities to include and engage others around you, promoting like-mindedness and an atmosphere of inclusiveness. As the lesser-experienced member, ask questions, create conversations and, most importantly, be prepared for the opportunity to lead up from a position of U1 or U2. One of the most basic and common areas for a lesser-experienced official to lead up is with outstanding rules knowledge. Next, total game awareness is key. Beyond rules, the biggest opportunity to assist involves the knowledge of the clocks. Place a priority on having outstanding clock awareness on each possession. From all three positions on the floor, sneak a peak on every possession and make sure the game clock (and shot clock) are properly running. As the shot clock moves toward the latter stage, be aware and ready to assist on potential violations.

Establishing a trust among your crew, as well as an open and inviting line of communication, is important. Regardless of the situation, as the officials bring information, one rule to live by with team officiating is that you must have absolute certainty and be willing to take full responsibility for the play with your immediate supervisor. Using those two guidelines allows you to take an extra moment, collect your thoughts and then react only if you can answer yes to both.

For most of us, team-officiating conversations have started and ended with out-of-bounds help. It is one of the most common topics, and we have all discussed that if there is information regarding the changing of an out-of-bounds play, we welcome our partners’ input. Remember trust and communication. If you as the partner come with absolute knowledge, trust the information and then have the ability to communicate all of the information, i.e. red number 34 was the last to touch the ball. Being specific in your information allows the ruling official to respond to a coach and communicate exactly why the decision was changed.

We covered having an ability to know when and when not to bring information. Take the same play in the first four minutes of the game, involving a first-year official in your league or conference and a 50-50 out-of- bounds decision. Now take the play involving the same official and put it in the last two minutes of the game. Does the level in which you work have replay? Are there rules that will allow you to use that technology given the uncertainty of the play? What if there is no replay and it is a 50-50 play? All are factors in knowing when and when not to assist. The best leaders have the ability to look into the big picture, and most importantly do what is right for the game.

Here is another example of a play that happens often, but we rarely discuss how to help. A player is in the act of shooting by rule, however our partner incorrectly administers the play as a non-shooting foul or visa versa. Or the offensive player jump stops after the illegal contact and is incorrectly awarded two shots. Again, do you have absolute knowledge? And are you willing to take full responsibility for the play? Those should always be your baselines.

Those types of plays are often more complicated. Try and approach your partner with a question: “Do you want help on this play?” This can be done subtly and without much distraction, often while your partner is moving to report the foul to the table. Doing so in this manner is not threatening and does not bring unwanted attention to your partner. It also allows your partner to let you know whether they want help or not.

Additionally, if you tell your partner you will take full responsibility for the play and they choose not to use your information, you have now allowed yourself an opportunity to explain to your supervisor what occurred should further postgame discussion be necessary, and the accountability now falls back on the partner who chose not to use the information.

Specific information, both in your communication to your partner and to the coaches, is a must. Try to preface your response with “by rule” as it is hard to dispute what follows. For example, we cannot award two shots because by rule a jump stop ends the continuous-shooting motion, or we should award two it properly. Failure to blow the whistle and stop play could result in players displaying anger, hostility or the dangerous swinging of elbows.

• A bounce pass to the post is deflected by the guard, allowing the post player and the defender to each get a hand decisively on the ball.
• The shooter drives the free-throw lane. In attempting to block the shot, the defender is able to place a hand on the ball to prevent the shooter from releasing the ball.
• A1 lobs the throw-in to A2. B1 and A2 each jump and get a hand on the ball. As they land, they maintain their hold on the ball.

In each of those situations, it is at that very moment when a held-ball situation occurred. Do not hesitate. Blow your whistle. Certain game situations will require a demonstrative whistle. Raise your arm in the air to display the stop-clock signal. Reach your arms out horizontally and point your thumbs straight up in the air. Signal in the direction the ball will be going, and make eye contact with your partner(s) while pointing to the spot of the throw-in.

(Editor’s note: Referee recommends using the stop-clock signal; however, NFHS and NCAA mechanics codes allow the option to stop the clock with a held-ball signal only.)

In a three-person game, one or two officials should converge on the play, while the third stays back to observe. In a two-person game, one official should converge. After the alternating-possession throw in, be sure the scorer changes the arrow’s direction.

A timeout cannot be granted to either team while opponents have their hands on the ball. Have a slow and steady whistle regarding timeouts, but a quick and decisive one regarding a held ball. Neither coach will take issue with a held-ball ruling, especially after your calm explanation that each player had a firm grip on the ball and safety is always a priority. But your conversation with the coach will take on a different tone if his or her player is down on the ground bleeding, the recipient of an elbow — a result of letting players decide possession instead of the official. The coach will be justifiably furious and may end up crossing a line that never needs to be stepped over. It is a technical foul not soon forgotten by the receiving coach and administering official.

The time on the clock and the score of the game have no significance in ruling a held ball. Be consistent with this decision in each game at each school. Do not let the players play through a held ball. There is no better demonstration of the rule to your friend in the stands than to see the play, enforce the rule, avoid injury and maintain control of the game.

The post Team Officiating Beyond Out-of-Bounds Plays appeared first on Referee.com.

All too often, basketball officials attempt to leave the impression that every game they officiate went from jump ball to final horn without a misstep by them or their crew.

Simply, that’s not true.

At the NBA level — where every whistle is graded — the world’s best basketball officials proudly proclaim a better-than-90 percent accuracy rate. At the NCAA Division I level, accuracy levels aren’t much different. They’re not far behind at the other lower collegiate levels, and accuracy levels remain high at the scholastic levels, too.

Yet there’s one place where accuracy levels are perfect — games with those officials who aren’t being honest with themselves or their partners.

After every game, an honest review of your performance includes the reality of missed calls and unique situations that weren’t handled quite right. Dealing in the cold, hard facts just might set your officiating goals free.

How does honesty become a part of your regimen? Like almost anything: by putting it into practice. That practice should include a thorough pregame and postgame discussion about the crew’s expectations, abilities and experience.

Honesty among a crew begins with establishing the boundaries of the discussion. A crew should establish when the pregame and postgame discussions will occur.

Pregame discussions do not need to be limited to locker rooms. Emails, phone calls and discussions on the way to the game are all appropriate communication forms to prepare. On-site pregames should include a discussion of the rules, mechanics and team tendencies. But if crewmembers are honest with their partners before the game about strengths and weaknesses, the pregame can be tailored to fit those areas.

Tell your partners if you are struggling with a portion of your officiating. If traveling is a problem, let them know. If you’ve had concerns with a team or are fighting through a physical ailment during the dog days of the season, your crew will be better prepared if they are told honestly about that up front.

Partners are more likely to react and be helpful both on and off the court if they are made aware of concerns ahead of time.

In game, it’s a challenge to be honest with partners. Opportunities to communicate are limited, and there isn’t time for training or teaching. However, if there are things to be discussed, do your best to make mental notes of them. Even jot them down at halftime if need be.

In an effort to work honestly with your crew, the postgame attitude of the crew is vital.

After many games, crews tend to believe they’ve once again officiated a great game. It’s human nature to believe that you got most of the calls right, stood in the proper positions with the right angles the entire game and used crisp mechanics to communicate your calls to everyone in attendance.

That’s false.

We need a strong postgame discussion reserved for many things that weren’t quite up to standard.

How long and how thorough the postgame will be can be affected by many things: locker room availability, travel distance and arrangements and personal commitments following the game can all impact when the postgame honesty occurs.

Nonetheless, at least 10 minutes should be set aside.

More importantly, a crew should agree when the “honesty” period will conclude. Honesty should rule the day, but there should be a time limit as to when the game review discussion should end.

Honesty and civility can sometimes mix like oil and water.

Sometimes a partner will not want to hear that he or she failed to deliver on a portion of the expected performance. The crewmember will consider it a personal attack because honesty has not been part of their previous regimen. Nothing but sticking to the plan will solve that problem. Do not let those not interested in honest assessments cause the process to break down.

Partners will push back on evaluation, thinking they had it right or — more likely — you have it wrong. Rise above that, remembering that honesty will make all of you better for the next game.

Finally, honesty and privacy go hand in hand. Your honest pregame and postgame discussions belong only to your crew. If you’ve received negative feedback, process it internally. Don’t take the message to others as a means to criticize your crewmates. If you’ve handed out criticism, remember that you were part of a crew that had the issue. Take the good with the bad.

Honestly, it’s not that hard.

The post Honesty Starts with Yourself appeared first on Referee.com.