[Terrapins Fan]

Well, I had an interesting night last night.

I did 3 middle school games. All girls, 6, 7 and 8th grade.


Starts with 6th grade girls. Both teams were pretty good. On one play, Visitor A1 drives to the basket and Defender B1 holds her position, A1 loses the ball and coach goes nuts. B1 gets the ball and fast break ensues. As B1 is pulling up the fastbreak, A's coach is still screaming about the last play and I have had enough. "T" Everything went well after that. Visitors were down 4 with under 45 seconds to play and scored 7 straight to win the game.

Game 2. 7th grade girls. Both teams were pretty good. Home team controlled the entire game and won easily. But in the 4th Q Home coach was tired of not getting the calls he thought he should get and complained on an easy call right in front of him, I had warned him earlier that we've heard enough. He complained again, very loud, and I whacked him. It quited him down and had no effect on the game.

Game 3 8th grade girls. Neither team is well coached and few players have any skills. In 1st Q, with under a minute to go, the score is 0-0 ( that is not a misprint 0-0) I am going from T to L I have the sideline and the deepest players. I see the ball go OOB on my side and I call the OOB. as I do, I have 4 players in front of me and I see a girl fall OOB about 40 feet from me. I have no idea why she fell or if she was pushed.

It's a visitors player and the coach , guess what, went nuts, really nuts, he comes on to the floor and starts screaming about his player being shoved and knocked down. I said, " coach go back to your box and I will talk to you" he screamed more. I've already called 2 "T"s and don't want another. I said, " coach, go back to your box and I will talk to you" he yells more "T" #3. I explain to my partner what is going on and the coach is still screaming that he is calling my assignor ( because they are friends ). I explain that I could careless who he calls. He tells me that if I do not get control of this game he is going to take his team home NOW. Again, I tell him, I don't care if he takes his team home, it's his choice. I also say that we are calling the fouls as we see them.

At that point, we had called 6 fouls on the home team and 3 on the visitors. It's still the first Q. Come to find out this is the assistant coach and not the head coach, I had no idea. Half the time, it's a parent or 2 coaching these teams. That was the case here. Anyway, Visitors won. Home team did not score until the 4th Q. Final 24-13.

3 more game days for me and it's over. I did get a play off game for Saturday night. I do think that working with these coaches as difficult as they are, makes you a better official, at least I hope so.