Sharp, I sympathize with your situation and also your feelings of self-doubt, even in the face of a stone-cold ejection lock (which, of course, it is).
This summer, I tossed an AAU coach for standing toe to toe with me and telling me he'd "rip that MFing whistle off your neck and shove it down your MFing throat!"
Picture Aaron Paul vs. Warren Sapp. Guess which one I was
.
Different from your scenario, however, was that I provoked him ... kind of. A little background: This guy called my lazy partner out for never switching and being completely oblivious to subs at the table (guilty on all counts and the reason he had risen to a state so agitated he challenged my P to a fight -- "You wanna go?") My partner's response was to play it cool and issue nary a warning, as he fancies himself the mid-50s "Marine look" type (think: guns like Hochuli). He also blows as an official b/c he's too cool to bother ... which, naturally, causes all sorts of problems when a game is only half officiated.
As the sages here say, "You promote what you permit." The coach's gloves were off when my partner passed on the boxing match without even a whistle. So when this psycho who'd been losing it all day had my ear during a technical foul (on one of his players), he said, "Man, these are just kids."
AND I SAID (calmly as ever, which probably didn't help) ...
"Exactly, and yet you're losing your mind over it."
The "t" on "it" hadn't even finished when he was on the court in homicide mode. One of his players later said, "He does this every game." I told the kid I felt bad for him and his teammates.
The lesson for me: Just keep it to yourself. There's no quip or retort worth having your life threatened by an unhinged psycho free to roam the sidelines of the outlaw society that is AAU basketball. You never know what felon-to-be is going to take offense to having his long-departed sanity called into question.
An hour later, the game ended and the site manager arranged to have me escorted to a different exit and brought my car there, as the coach -- who only left the gym after MUCH protestation and with two large males as escorts -- apparently stuck around awhile and made more threats in the parking lot.
Way off the path of your scenario, Sharp, as you didn't even do something slightly wrong as I did, but nonetheless you get to thinking ... especially in arenas far less regulated than the comparative "safety" of high school basketball.
The second-guessing is natural, even if logically it isn't. A lot of us have been there. Don't sweat it.