[Raymond]

Originally Posted by jTheUmp

When I think about it, this is a little bit odd:

I'm in the same officials association for both football and basketball.

In football, we stick to the same crews as much as possible... My 5-person high school crew was the same all year, except for two games where we had a replacement due to our L being out of town for his day job. My 7-person college crew was the same all year except for a couple of instances where a) our R missed a game due to a family wedding, b) our S got a D-1 assignment, and c) our crew got split up to cover 2 games at once... and, on that last one, I definitely could tell the difference in the smoothness of the officiating.

In basketball, I've worked with different people on almost every game, with relatively few repeats... and I haven't worked with anyone more than 3 times this season. I think some officials have regular partners; but I'm not one of them... so maybe I've just spent the season being the 3rd wheel.

Strange as it sounds, I actually like it that way... football officiating and basketball officiating differ so much that I think the crew philosophical differences make sense.

My growth as a basketball official would be stunted if I worked all or most of the season with the same 1-3 partners. I learn things, good and bad, from all the different partners I work with. Plus it sparks better pre-games in the locker room since we need to make sure we are on the same page.