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Hello All,
Here's the bg:
I'm officiating a memorial game. A student, and good basketball player, was killed last summer in an auto accident. He was very well liked by everyone, and they decided to hold a memorial game in his name.
So I'm the "senior" official in the game, as our board sometimes refers. (This just means that the other official has less experience.)
The home team got off to an early lead, and was up about 15 points for most of the game. The crowd was kinda into it, and kinda not. I've done a few of these "special games" in the past, and when the crowd is really into it, the atmosphere is AMAZING!
So in the third, I decide that I'm going to influence slightly the game. Here's the first influence that I did. Home team not up by only 9 jacks up a three. The player and I get along very well, as I know his whole family. So the 3 goes up, and he is fouled, but I would have ruled it after the shot. The shot misses. I decide not to call it (it wasn't a huge foul, but had it been a regular high school season game, I would have called it) so that the team losing by 9 now has possession.
Early fourth quarter: now a 7 point game, and the visiting team has the ball in the key. A player, among everyone, goes up and gets blocked. However, there is some body contact. Depending on the game, I might let it go, and I would have let it go normally in this game. However, I called it to give the visiting team 2 shots.
So, basically, I am admitting that I was not consistent on two calls. However, in the end, the visiting team ended up taking the lead with 2 minutes to go, obtained a 3 point lead with 1:05 to go, and the home team came back to win by 2 with 0:10 left.
But, the crowd was extremely into it. I mean, very much so. There was tonnes of cheering!
I'm just wondering if I stepped over a line with influencing a game?
What do you think?
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