The first part of my post was (mostly) kidding. What was meant seriously is what criteria should I use to make preferences between one side or the other. JRut, how did YOU choose between MBB and WBB? Was there an aspect of one game, or another that appealed to you?

You choose like you do anything else, you make a choice and pursue that choice. You decide what camps you want to go to and you pay for them. They are often expensive so it is better to make a choice that you will be comfortable with. Seriously, this is not that complicated. For me it was simply what I followed I wanted to be apart of. I never saw myself working women's college basketball let alone girl's basketball.

Peace

a) Your logic doesn't follow.

b) You need to make a personal choice (at some point). Because it's personal, no one here can tell you how to decide, or even what all the criteria are. And, because it's several years away, you don't need to worry about it yet.

Why do women's coaches not want officials who work men's games? Are they afraid that their players would be hurt if the officials use the men's standards to officiate women's games (advantage/disadvantage vs automatic calls)? IMO, if an official can keep the differences between high school and college straight, he can keep the NCAAW/NCAAM differences straight. Besides, some states have different rules for boys and girls (NY has girls play by (modified) NCAAW rules, whereas boys play NFHS, and some of the shot clock states (MD,CA,MA,WA) don't have a 10-second count for girls), so if an official came from such a state and had to remember the differences between boys and girls rules and mechanics, what is to say that he can't do the same for men's and women's games at the college level?

I'm not denying that the games are different with respect to rules and mechanics. However, there are many similarities as well (both now use a 30-second shot clock, both discourage rotations late in the shot clock, and there is not an action which is a foul in women's basketball that is legal in men's, or the reverse, different terminology notwithstanding).

For the record, I now have a slight preference for men's basketball, after watching videos of both men's and women's officials in action, and seeing that the men's officials appear to have cleaner mechanics and higher playcalling percentages. But I would not object if I was assigned to work both flavors of college basketball.

Genders ...
 

Here in Connecticut, with the exception of a different size basketball, boys and girls high school teams use the same rules, and mechanics. Yet, I often have problems adjusting from a Thursday night girls high school varsity game to a Friday night boys high school varsity game. Different speeds, muscular differences, play above, or below, the rim, different ability to play through contact. It takes me a few minutes to get my mind in synch with what's going on on the floor (yet the reverse, boys to girls game, is not a problem for me). I know of many colleagues on my local board that have the same adjustment problem.

That's not going to happen. You're going to have to make a choice, or a choice will be made for you if/when someone hires you.

The games are not only different, they are played differently. They are executed differently. The philosophies are different. A high school girls basketball game is very different than high school boys game and why even at that level in my state many people (assignors, coaches, administrators) do not want officials that work both often. And just so you know you are not likely to ever be assigned to both at the college level. Heck, you going to a Men's camp and if you say you work Women's basketball, that might eliminate you from consideration at that camp for assignments.

Again this is one of these things that is not our rule on this site, it is one that has been well established before many of us started or the way it was in our careers. High school ball may not have that same standard based on where you are at, but I work entirely a boys basketball schedule in two states and often the better officials work those games consistently. Just the way it is and I doubt that is going to change unless the number of officials just fall off, which they have not in my state. But then again you cannot make officials take games they wish not to work on many levels without consequences.

Peace

Only Working Girls ...
 

Agree.

As some of our local guys age, put on few pounds, slow down, or develop leg, and hip, problems (arthritis, etc.), they will often switch from doing both genders to only working girls. Right there, that tells you a little (not a significant number, but enough to skew the curve) about the quality of guys that officiate girls games.

With my patellofemoral pain syndrome in my left knee, and a bone spur, and osteoarthritis in my right ankle (no elective surgery allowed for twenty more months because I'm on blood thinners to keep my stent open), I may fall into that category in a few years, although I have lost twenty-five pounds since my heart attack ten months ago.

Congrats, hope and pray you stay healthy.

I'm Like The Freaking Six Million Dollar Man ...
 

Thanks.

I'm at the gym six days a week, 30 minutes on the treadmill, fast walking pace, steep incline.

I've got three zotarolimus eluting coronary stents in my left anterior descending coronary artery (the infamous widow maker).

Medications include a lipid lowering agent, a platelet aggregation inhibitor, an ACE inhibitor, a beta blocker, and a low dose aspirin.

Scientists have kept me alive by implanting high tech devices in me, with a regime of modern pharmaceuticals.

I'm like the freaking Six Million Dollar Man.

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.r...=0&w=300&h=170

Now, where did I leave my car keys?

It's a pity that CT only uses 2-man for anything other than the state playoffs. 3-man would keep BillyMac going for longer, whether at the boys or girls levels. It seems very unfortunate that officials are segregated by gender in NCAA basketball, and that lesser officials usually work women's games as compared to men's games, but it is the way it is. I must thus resign myself to a fate of being exclusively a men's official:(. I could learn a lot from both games, but I believe that choosing men's basketball would be the better choice long-term. I won't be fast-tracked in women's basketball, and I can learn the NBA mechanics doing pro-am, so women's basketball won't have any real advantages for me.

Let us know when you get your first WCAC game.

Until that time, save us from further niggling questions. Time for more work and less talk.

Bye!!

The Land Of Steady Habits ...
 

While the spirit of ilyazhito's post is correct, for the record, some of the major rivalry regular season games will get three person crews (more likely in some local boards other than in my own). All Connecticut quarterfinal state tournament games and beyond, both genders, all levels, get three person crews, as well as those major rivalry games in earlier state tournament rounds.

The most successful (who are often the most vocal) basketball coaches in the Connecticut High School Coaches Association (I'm a former member) don't want three person crews (they believe that too many fouls will be called) for regular season games. School principals, school athletic directors, and the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (the state interscholastic sports governing body) all listen to the coaches' "lobby" and voilà, mostly two person regular season games. The principals (who mainly run the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference) and athletic directors don't put up much of a fight because it saves them money. The coaches win, the athletic budgets win, and the sport loses. "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" (Meat Loaf, 1977).

Speaking of no 3-person, the belief that officials in a 3-person crew call more fouls is misguided. In my experience, both me and my partners have called less fouls than we would in a 2-person game. It could be that the athletes in games with 3-person crews are better, and more disciplined, and thus commit less fouls, but the main reason is that 3 officials can be in better position to make calls than 2 officials can be, because the primary areas of responsibility are smaller than in 2-person mechanics. This leads to officials guessing less and calling only what is obvious to them in their area. Because they call only the obvious fouls, the games under a 3-person system have less whistles than similar games under a 2-person system.

@justacoach, I have called games in the WCAC (JV girls), so your comment is not very apropos.

I created this thread so that officials on the fence could know some of the differences between men's and women's college basketball, from an officiating perspective, as well as to find out if it were possible to actually work both sexes. Now I know that working both sexes simultaneously is not possible, except maybe at the junior college level. Is this the reason why some JUCO men's officials use women's signals in men's games (counting with 1 hand and making a fist to start the clock, instead of the CCA Men's approved method of raising one hand, counting with the other, and chopping the raised hand)?

A lot of officials at all levels do not always do what their respective manuals suggest they should. There are a lot of reasons for that.