Hello. Love ya’ love your show. Long time listener; first time caller. Etc. etc.
I thought I would share my story of my first week of refereeing. Last Thursday (freshmen boys) was my second night of paid referring ever. Who would have guessed that I would be the veteran official in the 2-man crew? Turns out that it was my partner’s first game. My thought was who would schedule two rookies together for their first games?
I was hoping to have a veteran with me to give me some pointers. I don’t know what is expected of rookies, but I think we both did a good job. Almost no complaints from the benches (we didn’t tell them that it was our first game). The only complaining I got was well deserved when team A inbounded the ball in their backcourt. Everyone, including the officials, thought they were throwing it in in their frontcourt. Well, there was one kid from A who did know the correct basket, and he took off for an uncontested lay-up. Well, shortly after I blew the whistle for what I thought was a backcourt violation, I realized the error of my way, and called it an inadvertent whistle.
No big deal, because they were up by 20. The home team coach did let me know that I stole an uncontested lay-up from him though. I think the fans were gentle on me for that bone head call. Has this ever happened to anyone else in their less-experienced days?