[ace]

I'm a new official in our chapter, not new to basketball though, and I worked with a girl one week and this was her first game E-V-E-R. Her mentor was also there and she was nervous as all get out. I stood behind her 100% even when i questioned a call, because I still stayed in my primary. I kept plenty of eye contact with her and gave her a little wink or thumbs up when she was looking at me. WE got thorugh the game. We worked together a few weeks later and she had made a VAST improvement. I was totally shocked. I told her in pregame I had had a rough day... me and my gf had a big fight and stuff and it was really kinna funny that when i kicked a call she was winking and giving me the thumbs up LOL. But yeah. I just try to encourage. We pregrammed that if a wierd play happened that we'd point to our heads very discretly and as in "rembeer that play" and during the next t/o or quarter or half time we'd talk about it and figure it out so that if we see it again to know what to do. Thats just some of the things I do. If the fouls are lopsided I'll meet em at half court at half or to real quick and say - ok - fouls are lopsided lets talk about htat and we try to figure it out.... One partner (1st year) said ima call everything i see on red... he did... they're were only 2 fouls in the first 3 min. That showed me right there that some times with lopsisded counts or violations that some teams just do it more than others.