Ok, first of all. . .
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Originally Posted by Junker
I'm about 5'11", a short guy around college officials
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Shut up.
Now that we've gotten that out of the way. . .
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it seems that there's a little more competition rather than commraderie on the men's side. As for women, the advantages are that the games seem a little more laid back, the play is less physical and closer to what I see now in HS, more of a fellowship of officials (or so it seems from what I've seen so far) and I think I could advance a little more quickly and to a higher level on the women's side. Drawbacks are that I don't want to get on in my career and wonder if I could have made it with the men and the athleticism is much better for the men.
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I agree with your ads and disads, although I will say that I agree with Mick about the comraderie. It will be what you make of it. There is a great deal of competition on the men's side and many guys stay on longer than they should just b/c they can't give it up. (And my guess is that both of those things are true on the women's side, too.)
But I have made GREAT friends at camps, even though I am, in a sense, competing with them for a future roster spot. Dan_ref and I had dinner together just last night, which was great b/c I hadn't seen him in over a year. I'm gonna spend a night in a hotel room with 4 other guys on a road trip next week. There are good relationships and comraderie out there.
Whether deserved or not, there is a prestige involved in working Men's ball. To some people, that is probably very important. If it's not that important to you, then my guess is that you'll have more chance to move up quickly on the Women's side. (Of course, you'll have to learn the crappy mechanics that they use.
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The only drawback to Women's ball that you don't mention is that (IMHO) the quality of play at the D3 level is substantially lower than the level of play on the Men's side. As you move up, I'm sure the level of play is much better and maybe even closer to the level of play on the Men's side. But when you're first starting out, you are going to watch some pretty bad basketball.
One of the advantages to Women's ball that you don't mention is that the Women's game (at the D2/D3 level) is often played immediately before the Men's game. So you finish the game and get home before we've finished the first half of our game. I'm not being flippant, either. I've had Women's officials tell me that they love being home early and not having to drive home at 11 pm. If you have a family or are going to be starting one, that might be a consideration for you.
I'm a Men's official b/c I didn't know there was a choice. The president of my HS association handed me an application and told me to fill it out. So I did. It was for a men's collegiate association. I didn't even know there were other options. But whatever you choose, it's got to be b/c it's what you
want. If you don't have a passion for it, you won't last. Good luck.