...and am a little nervous. Even though I now have a season under my [flex]belt, it was a season of middle school through JV. I have a mindset of approaching this game like any other, even though it's Varsity and the Championship tournament.

Any tips to help calm these butterflies?

Thanks

It is another game, the difference is the players are better. Once you get used to the change in ability of the players, it becomes easier.

In fact, varsity games are easier than lower games, once you get used to the speed. The kids know what they are doing and fewer weird things happen.

The only thing hard about varsity is handling the coaches. You have to be a bit more flexible in handling them. Don't let their screaming about a play get to you. You let it get to you and your game will go south fast. Stay focused and stay positive. The crowd won't be a factor. It is harder to officiate a game with 10 people watching than with 1000. No one person can anoy you then. Enjoy.

To paraphrase Woody Allen - "Varsity games are just like any other games - except different".

Hope that helps.

We all have been there.
 

You will be nervous. You will mess up. And if you want to continue to do them, you will get over it.

This is just a first step in a long journey. Enjoy the ride. ;)

Peace

Go early and watch a little of the game before yours.
Spend a few minutes talking to yourself about being sharp and on the ball.
Be sure your partner knows it's your first varsity game, and that you feel very confident and have a good anticipation.
Go out and hear the music.
Most of all have fun!

Juulie and Jeff gave great advice.

You'll be nervous. You'll likely screw up. It's OK. Don't worry about dueling with the coaches if they want to test you. It's OK to not blow your whistle. If you have a good partner he'll lower his trigger and T anything that moves. Try to get there first, relax, follow your partner's lead.

Have fun!

You're there because someone thought you could handle it. Smile once in a while... enjoy it. It's the reward of working hard at your craft.

Z

I was told at a camp to break the game down in 4 minute sections and concentrate hard for each section.

Excellent
 

This is good advice for all participants :)

You will have two other refs with you, get to know them the best you can before the game. They wont let you down, meaning they will keep you from going down in flames. So enjoy the ride and dont let your butterflies jinx the moment!

So, Luv4Asian8, was it yesterday? How'd it go? Did you get any sleep afterward?

And if it was yesterday did you replay it all night long in you head?

I suppose that is meaningful to some, but sayings like that always make me laugh. Why not break it down into 16 two minute sections. Why not break it down into 32 one minute sections. Or maybe, just concentrate for one big 32 minute section.

Yeah, I know.. I'm being sarcastic and the point is to maintain focus, but some of these "ref sayings" are pretty inane when you really think about them.

One time an official told me that the middle of the third quarter was the most important part of the game for us to set the tone. I'm still trying to figure that one out. Maybe I'm just too dense.

Z

I'm not smart enough to figure out the 3rd quarter thing either. But the four minute deal comes from the D1 guys, TV timeouts.

True for the most part, but my most bizzare incident happened in a boys varsity last year. I've been wanting to get this off my chest since it happened, so this seems like as good a time as any. Long, but an important lesson here.

Boys Varsity towards end of the season. We have a conference champ playing at 5 or 6 place team big rivalry. On paper, it looks to be a blow-out and a foul fest. As we pull up to the HS we assume there must be some other event going on because we can't even find a place to park. Nope, they are all here for the game. Packed house with extra bleaches brought in. Full band and both Home and Visitors have their chearleader squads. During pregame meeting, the scorer says he brought extra pencils becuase in his words, it was going to be ugly. I'm U in 2-man. V controls the tip and on the subsequent drive is fouled hard but nothing out of line. As I'm standing there while he's shooting his FT's, I look up at the clock and notice 10 seconds have come off the clock. I do some quick math and figure if this keeps up we'll have all the players fouled out and go home before at the end of the 1st. Next time down the court I've got a PC foul against V. Coach complains a bit, we switch, bam, same exact play going the other way. Another PC. H coach complains a bit, I told him exact same call as 10 seconds earlier. All is well but we've got 3 fouls in the first minute of the game. Kids settled down and we finished the half with V is up by 3 at the half with foul count of 4-3. Great game. Can't even hear each other's whistles at full volume. Both sided with their cheers of "conference champs" replied with "Over rated" stuff like that all game long. Truly the most electric atmosphere I've ever been in.

End of third with 0:12 seconds left, V up by 5, we have a TO after a made basket by H. V6 subs in and H lines up for a press. I'm new lead at midcourt opposite table to help with the b/c pressure. V1 inbounds to V6 who is pressured just below the FT line. He is double teamed and gets confused wiht the pressure and figures the path of no resistance is towards the basket and goes in for an uncontested layup at H's basket. As soon as he does this, I look to the scorer and show them "2" and point to Home's bench to get them to score the basket for H. I look up at the scoreboard to make sure the points get credited to the correct team. While I'm trying to check that, everyone, including my partner is now confused. Time is ticking down and now there's just a few ticks left on the clock. H1 grabs the ball and inbounds it to H2 and everyone starts going the wrong way (me too at this point). H2 is the bright one, and he turns around and scores another uncontested basket for H. Time expires. Both coaches come out with H saying, you can't correct that and V saying, you can't count that. We meet and get away from the coaches. We discuss it and neither of us think we can correct it because it doesn't fit the scenario of a correctable error. We go back to the coaches and R explains our decision. V coach is naturally upset. We do our best at explaining why it's not correctable. Coach doesn't like it but eventually we get going again and start the intermission while we go to the table and make sure they get the score right. They never added the last basket, I know this because I looked at the scorboard when it initally happened. We confirm it with the scorers and get the timer to add 2 to H's score on the board. Fan's go crazy and gets coach involved again. Explain it to him and his scorer confirms that based on our interpretation, the score is correct on the board. It's now a 1 pt game. We trade leads back and forth through much of the fourth period, I got 2 more PC fouls on V's PG for pushing off with his off arm and the coach really took those pretty well chastising his PG instead of me. Ends up being a 1 pt game with V up by one and H has a last second attempt coming out of a TO at DL. They run a high post but defense disrupts it and they end up with their center having to take an out of control desperation shot while driving to the basket. I'm lead and there is no contact, game over, get our butts out of there. No confrontations, just get showered and leave. We talk about it and without a book handy we came up with the decision that we should have blown the play dead right after the initial wrong basket to confer with scorer and get everyone back on track. We drafted an email to the coach on the following Monday after reveiwing the proper procedure which would have been to cancel the score (CB Rule 10.?) and admitted our error. We sent it to him and then got a reply from him saying, thanks, hope to see you work one of our games again. We were pleased that he took it well. Within minutes we got an email from the State asking for our take on what happened because the AD complained and the state upheld our gametime decision but the coach forwarded the AD our email that admitter our error (you confused yet?). Well, it all boiled down that we were wrong, the State supported our initial and then revised interpretation, and all ends well. However, I did not get an availability sheet for that conference for next season.

So, you are correct that normally things are better at Varsity level. That is especially true with coaches. However, the weird does still happen and usually to me. Thanks for listening.

Mregor

What can happen is that as a quarter or half progresses, you tend to slide along a little more. You see it with teams, I see it with myself at times. You have moments where you lose that sharp focus you had at the outset of a period. When my team looks like it is having that issue, it is TO time. Hopefully my team and I don't have it at the same time or it is goodnight time.

So I see the subdivision as a checkpoint to say, "am I maintaining focus."

Don't undrstand the third quarter thing for certain, but I do think that everybody thinks about setting a tone in the first quarter - everybody is discovering how the game is going to be played/called/etc. Maybe this is just a way of emphasizing that you need to start the second half stron to make it clear how the rest of the game is going to go. Certainly the third quarter can be critical in determining a team's fate - frequently the way the third quarter goes can swing a game one way or another.

Good story.

The way I read it V scored in H basket then H took the ball out, scoring 2 more points. If I got this right you got it wrong. V was entitled to the ball at that point. There's a case play that sez to take off the points.

In any event I would have blown the whistle and killed play as soon as V scored 2 points for H. Talk to the table, talk to the coaches, talk to your partner.

Then you don't you just say you're going to focus for the entire season...or for anything you do in your entire life?

Reason is the human brain is easily overwhelmed by huge problems. Break it down into managable pieces and we can deal with it. Focussing on 4 minute segments of a basketball game seems managable to me.

I can only manage about 30-seconds. What's overwhelming for me is that I have to do that 64 times!!

Yeah, but only one at a time ;)

I don't see...
 

The real benefit of breaking it down time-wise.

I like to use self-talk and focusing on elements WITHIN the game. I'll tell myself stay offball, and I'll really attack that aspect of the game. That has always locked me into the game, and increased my level of focus.

Re: I don't see...
 

whatever works

Luv, couple of questions -

(1) Are you saying you are doing varsity game after 1 year experience? or that you completed another year's experience? (2) Varsity basketball on 5/14????? Where are you officiating?

__________________________________________________ ______
"The more time you have to think things through, the more you have to screw it up."--Clint Eastwood

This reminds me of that old standby:

THe sooner you get behind, the more time you have to catch up.

I'm guessing he's doing a summer league and a varsity game in that league. That's where most of us slower-up-the-ladder types start doing varsity. It's almost as good as that first season, league, conference varsity game. Almost, but not quite.

Rainmaker, I'd say that is a good educated guess and until I hear otherwise I'll go with that one!. OK, I've done summer league early on in my career. As you say, exciting but not quite the same. My first varsity game had a 7 footer in it. I purposely went over and stood next to him just to see what it felt like standing next to one!

BTW, I see you are into quotes as well. Been catching up my whole life, it seems, including answering these posts.

__________________________________________________ ________
"I've developed a new philosophy--I only dread one day at a time."--Charlie Brown

I'm pretty sure if we asked Rickref the official who told him this does college ball with TV timeouts. Breaking it down like this takes you from one timeout to the next. I've heard Dave Libbey say the same thing.

First "real" varsity game, or first summer varsity game? My first summer varsity game was actually at an all-star camp with D1 players for counselors. The counselors were allowed to play a little, so I was actually reffing Thalo Green at one point. Sheez, was I in over my head or what!?!?

First real varsity game was 1A girls, a little Christian school against another little Christian school. Absolutely NBD. But it was still more exciting, more cool, more everything than that camp game. This spring at our association banquet, the guy who was my partner for that first real varsity game, came over and introduced himself to my husband. He said, "Hope you don't mind me saying this, but I'll always cherish being her first." Kind of corny, but I felt that way about him, too. He was the first. I don't even remember who my partner was at that camp game.

Well, at least you learned the proper way to handle this situation. I'm surprised though that you have never had this come up before. It seems that lower level teams score in the wrong basket quite frequently.
Your Case Book reference is 10.1.8 and the Comment at the end. Also, in the Simplified and Illustrated the procedure which tells you to stop the game after a goal at the wrong basket is on the top of page 23. It's labelled 4-5-2.

It was very upstanding of you and your partner to admit your mistake and send the email. I think it is their loss, if that conference doesn't invite you back. You seem to care about getting it right (even though you made a mistake this time), and I would think that they would want the conscientious official on the court.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by tomegun

Quote:

I'm pretty sure if we asked Rickref the official who told him this does college ball with TV timeouts. Breaking it down like this takes you from one timeout to the next. I've heard Dave Libbey say the same thing.

Probably. Hey, I understand the quote guys and gals. It's just that quotes like tend to be meaningless to me personally. If it helps you, more power to you. I try to concentrate the whole time and find little value in breaking up my game into pieces of concentration. Cliches have just never done much for me.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go give 110%. I have to take it one game at a time. I have to play the hand I was dealt.. etc. etc.

Z

Yep, kicked it all the way. Never saw that CB play in rule 10. I came on here and asked and someone (Tony) pointed it out to me. All we could think of at the time was correctable error (not correctable) and T for leaving the court for an unauthorized reason. I don't know what I would have done if I was watching it closely. As it was, I was concentrating on the table and the scoreboard to make sure they got it right. I never really realized the wrong team was inbounding. As for blowing the whistle right after the score in the wrong basket, that's what we came up with on the ride home. We should have killed it, got the book and board right, then put it back in play. One of the best games I've had for 31:50. Those other 0:10 are what killed us.

Mregor

Dont feel bad for not knowing the rule. ast season in a J.V. game the same thing happened, but my partner started a 5 secound count back on the team that made the wrong basket. Fortunatly for us the coach called a time out, so that bailed us out f the problem!

So what everyone is saying is that after a made basket for the wrong team the refs should call a time out to score it to the team whos basket it went in, then let the team who scored the wrong basket to take the ball out again, correct?

That's what I would do. Also, Have the scorer note that the basket was scored by the other team at the bottom of the book. No player gets credited for those points.

I had a kid in a 5th/6th grade game inbound the ball, they shot at the wrong basket, got the rebound, shot and missed again and got the rebound, shot again, missed and rebounded the ball, whistle for ten second violation.