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Jurassic Referee,
What I did in my post (which I read SEVERAL times before submitting it), was look at the whole situation, and not simply nail a college kid to a wall by looking at his reaction in a vaccuum. I prefaced my comments by saying that Christensen was way out of line. What I wanted to do was try to understand his reaction. I think that the events at the end of the game go a long way toward achieving that end.
Let me add a couple of points as a fan that I did not include in my first post. Duke shot 10-19 from the free throw line, and was out-rebounded by about 20 in the game. They did not display much if any intensity in the second half against a team that was ready to beat the world if they needed to. Given these facts, how could any reasonable person argue that Duke should have won the game, under any circumstances?
Indiana is no less deserving of that win than they would have been if the calls Christensen was upset about had gone the other way. It's interesting to me, though, that in attempting to explain why christensen acted as he did, that you think I was defending him, per se. Well, yes, Alex, I'll take semantics for $1000. I was 'defending' him to the extent that I don't think that a college kid in that situation should have his character attacked because of one mistake. If you think that I was 'excusing' his actions, then you're wrong. There is no excuse. It seems to me that what's bugging you is that deep down you have some sympathy, and maybe empathy for the kid. I noticed that you didn't take issue with my assessments of the plays brought up, you were just affronted by the idea that I would bring them up int he first place. For anyone, duke supporter or not, to have those feelings does not make one a whiner, it does not mean one is 'blaming the refs' for the loss. It means one is a thinking, feeling individual. If these things make me a whiny fan, or a bad official, I'll be able to sleep soundly with that.
You know what I get 'sick of'? Officials like you who are stuck in this twilight zone where other officials never make mistakes, and where those who happen to note those mistakes are whiny fans, or officials who can't separate being a fan and being an official. Maybe you're so perfect that you've never kicked a call that you felt affected the outcome of a game. I am not in that boat. I recognize my fallability, and, though i try not to dwell on it, it certainly bothers me when I miss an important call. And I'm not going to get my feelings hurt if another official thinks I missed an important call; nor do I think that a colleague expressing such an opinion constitutes me getting 'crapped on.' It's all in the way that such a thing is expressed, and I think that it can be done constructively. Your comments imply to me a fundamental disagreement with this idea.
So yes, I, an official and a good one, think that that crew missed a couple of important calls down the stretch. However, I am well-aware of the tremendous ability of these men to make it as far as they have in their careers, and that game has not diminished my respect for them as officials one iota. And I'd be willing to bet that if any of these guys read my comments, they would not feel that they'd been 'crapped on.' They wouldn't have made it as far as they have if their skins were that thin.
I guess that I'm just glad that you and people that share your feelings on this and similar issues are not big-time supervisors, because if you were, nobody would ever get any better, because they'd always be thinking that they'd called the perfect game.
As far as your as your assertions that I trotted out the standard, "our fans are better than your fans," that's just a blatant twisting of words. I didn't say that Duke's fans are as a rule better than UNC's. What I did was inform BKBRef that a Carolina fan complaining about Duke bench decorum was equivalent to a U of Cincinnati fan giving grief to a fan of any school because one of that school's players had had a run-in with the law. But since you're 'not an ACC fan,' and 'could care less,' oh, never mind.
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