Officials and Sex Discrimination

[Mark Dexter]

Boys' and girls' basketball are completely different animals. While I enjoy both, they have very different styles of play, and they require different refereeing attitudes.

I think the best solution is not to force good girls' officials to work boys' games or vice versa, but to specialize (from HS varsity on), and encourage good officials to join the girls' track (there are obviously many who wish to join the boys' track). Unfortunately, this is tough as boys' basketball is far superior and far more popular than girls' basketball in many regions of the country.

[ChrisSportsFan]

no doubt, the boys game is different from the girls game and switching back and forth requires an official to adjust. i work both because i'm new to my area and it's the politically correct thing to do and i want to work so i do it. if i could choose, do i have a preference? YES! But it kinda seems like a cop-out for a senior official to tell his assignor that he can work only work bays games because the games are so different. You haven't always worked only BV, and hopefully you've improved over the years, so you should be able to adjust. if that were the case, how do you adjust from NFHS to NCAA?

Again, we all have our preferences but maybe a better excuse could be used.

[rainmaker]

Originally posted by ChrisSportsFan
no doubt, the boys game is different from the girls game and switching back and forth requires an official to adjust. i work both because i'm new to my area and it's the politically correct thing to do and i want to work so i do it. if i could choose, do i have a preference? YES! But it kinda seems like a cop-out for a senior official to tell his assignor that he can work only work bays games because the games are so different. You haven't always worked only BV, and hopefully you've improved over the years, so you should be able to adjust. if that were the case, how do you adjust from NFHS to NCAA?

Again, we all have our preferences but maybe a better excuse could be used.

I think you're right about the very, very best officials.
Learning to adjust is part of their skill development. However, the next couple tiers down in ability, it's pretty difficult. Especially to go back and forth from evening to evening.

The problem is less real than apparent, though, in thinking that the better refs prefer boys' games. I'm not at all sure that's true. Around here at least some of the very best refs have never done anything but girls'. They chose that track early on, because there is less competition and they've moved up more quickly. They probably could compete for the boys' games, but don't see why they should hang around in the middle of the pack, when they are good enough to work the top games. But then, we've got a lot of top quality girls' teams around here, so perhaps our situation is deifferent from many.