A forewarning, this post is a bit verbose and rambling but I just felt compelled to share.
Had a couple of boys middle school games today. The 7th grade game was a little sloppy but not too bad and ended up going into OT. Sorry Mark, I'll do better next time.
Had both coaches a little unhappy with us over some calls but nothing too out of hand.
We get ready to start the 8th grade game and we have definitely stepped it up a notch. I'm half tempted to check the drivers license on half of these kids. The game is a physical one with the visiting team committing quite a few fouls, which is causing their head coach to get louder, alternating between yelling at his players and voicing his displeasure with our call selection.
The visiting team goes into the bonus in the beginning of the fourth quarter and while we're lining up to shoot free throws after a foul, the visiting coach starts in on us about the disparity in the foul count. My partner has enough and warns him. The coach quiets down for a while and we continue.
With about two minutes left, I call a pushing foul on a visiting team player for going through the back of a home player during a rebound. A solid foul and an easy call. I go to the table to report and the visiting coach is furious. He screams at me "13 fouls to one, so that's how it's going to be HUH?!"
It was instinctive for me and almost an out of body experience as I hit the whistle and T'd up the coach. The best part of it was that he stopped in mid tirade, stared at me with mouth gaping and then managed to stammer out a meek "Well OK then." He wasn't even correct about the foul counts, go figure.
In retrospect, we probably let him carry on too long throughout the game. I'll chalk that one up as a lesson learned. All in all, I feel that I had a good couple of games and my veteran partner was pleased with how I did as well.
The coach's expression tonight was priceless. I'd be lying if I said tonight's post-game Dr. Pepper didn't taste just a bit better than normal.
