East Chicago coach Pete Trgovich blasts officiating

[ODog]

In the event the poor bastard at the center of this mess (the official, NOT the coach) visits this forum, GREAT JOB!

Perfect position, terrific patient whistle, excellent mechanics befitting the moment. He saw what we all saw on the video: the defender's arm snaked around the intended recipient from before the pass was even released. He gave the kid every opportunity to let go and even waited to see the result of the play before he whistled the foul. Outstanding!

The rest of this is a total joke and also totally unsurprising given today's "sporting" climate to which we're all unfortunately accustomed.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by ODog

In the event the poor bastard at the center of this mess (the official, NOT the coach) visits this forum, GREAT JOB!

Perfect position, terrific patient whistle, excellent mechanics befitting the moment. He saw what we all saw on the video: the defender's arm snaked around the intended recipient from before the pass was even released. He gave the kid every opportunity to let go and even waited to see the result of the play before he whistled the foul. Outstanding!

The rest of this is a total joke and also totally unsurprising given today's "sporting" climate to which we're all unfortunately accustomed.

^^^^^^^ well said!

In my personal, qualitative experience as an official I have found the racial composition of my referee brethren to closely mirror the racial demographics of the United States as a whole, with a few exceptions. Here's the breakdown:

United States racial breakdown:
White: 63.7%
Black: 12.2%
Asian: 4.7%
Hispanic: 16.3%
Other races: 3.1%

The national white/black ratio is roughly 5 to 1 (.1915), which is perhaps comparable to the racial demographics of officials nationwide.

Indiana racial breakdown:
White: 80.0%
Black: 9.6%
Asian: 2.1%
Hispanic: 6.7%
Other races: 1.6%

The Indiana white/black ratio is roughly 8.3 to 1 (.1200).

In Indiana they send 9 officials to the regional to work 3 games. Thus, you can expect 7.92 white officials and 1.08 black officials at each site, disregarding travel/location assigning preferences. At East Chicago Central's site there were 8 white refs and 1 black ref (who worked the evening final), which is perfectly on par with Indiana demographics. This does not indicate a lower number of black refs working regional games however -- another regional was assigned 4 black officials. In fact the overall regional assignments for black officials in Indiana were 17/144, for 11.8%. That's almost exactly on par with Indiana's racial demographics.

I am very interested to hear what kind of demographic numbers the IHSAA will release.

[crosscountry55]

Originally Posted by AremRed

In my personal, qualitative experience as an official I have found the racial composition of my referee brethren to closely mirror the racial demographics of the United States as a whole, with a few exceptions. Here's the breakdown:

United States racial breakdown:
White: 63.7%
Black: 12.2%
Asian: 4.7%
Hispanic: 16.3%
Other races: 3.1%

The national white/black ratio is roughly 5 to 1 (.1915), which is perhaps comparable to the racial demographics of officials nationwide.

Indiana racial breakdown:
White: 80.0%
Black: 9.6%
Asian: 2.1%
Hispanic: 6.7%
Other races: 1.6%

The Indiana white/black ratio is roughly 8.3 to 1 (.1200).

In Indiana they send 9 officials to the regional to work 3 games. Thus, you can expect 7.2 white officials and 1.8 black officials at each site, disregarding travel/location assigning preferences. At East Chicago Central's site there were 8 white refs and 1 black ref (who worked the evening final). This does not indicate a lower number of black refs working regional games however -- another regional was assigned 4 black officials. The overall regional assignments for black officials in Indiana were 17/144, for 11.8%. That's actually higher than expected given the Indiana racial demographics.

I am very interested to hear what kind of demographic numbers the IHSAA will release.

AremRed....fascinating perspective. I would not be surprised if the IHSAA numbers confirm that the ratio of black/minority officials exceeds the state census ratio that you presented. I'd wager that this is the case in most states. By no means do I intend to sound insensitive by saying this, but as minorities tend to have lower per capita incomes, I believe the avocation of officiating basketball tends to be more attractive from a recruiting and retention standpoint as a means of supplementing income.

Again, I'm speaking strictly demographically, but what I'm trying to say in a roundabout way is that Coach Trgovich is full of poop.

Originally Posted by crosscountry55

AremRed....fascinating perspective. I would not be surprised if the IHSAA numbers confirm that the ratio of black/minority officials exceeds the state census ratio that you presented. I'd wager that this is the case in most states. By no means do I intend to sound insensitive by saying this, but as minorities tend to have lower per capita incomes, I believe the avocation of officiating basketball tends to be more attractive from a recruiting and retention standpoint as a means of supplementing income.

I agree with your analysis for the most part. In my experience the ratio of white/black refs is MUCH lower when I'm working recreational/travel/AAU basketball where an NFHS license is not required. The cost of licensure, cost of time invested, etc to work the postseason is indeed a factor as well.

I would be most interested in comparing the demographics of the overall IHSAA basketball official population to the demographics of officials advancing at every level of the tournament. If those numbers are statistically significant they could lend insight as to any racial bias inherent in the system.