Coaches during blowouts

[Rich]

Tonight I worked a 2-person boys varsity game. It was over, early. The final was 68-38 and it wasn't that close.

In the fourth quarter, both coaches got my attention in a not-so-nice way.

(1) I am trail in front of the home bench when the ball gets knocked out of bounds and rolls away. H coach tells me, "You're doing an excellent job tonight." Too much emphasis on the YOU'RE. I decide to play with him a bit and thanked him. Then I stopped and said, "Now that wasn't a loaded comment, was it?" THEN he said, "I mean it sincerely. Now, the other guy...." and I stopped him and started laughing and told him "that's what I get for listening to compliments" and put the ball into play. Not a long diversion and I told my partner about it in the locker room and we had a good laugh.

(2) V just kept fouling and fouling in the second half. 7-0 on the board, then 7-1, 8-1, 9-1. The ninth foul was the center fouling out. I called the foul as the trail and decided to report and notify in one shot. And that's what I get for not letting the non-calling official notify. The V coach decided to tell me, "We're getting our asses kicked out here and you keep calling fouls on us. Why don't you let them play? Don't tell me there aren't any fouls down here....." I had already started the clock and all of a sudden, my partner gets there and handles the coach before I say something stupid.

I hated both situations, but they still make me laugh now. The second situation aggravated me, though. I worked hard all the way through the game and I'd have been quite happy to call fouls on the home team, if they actually had any. And it's not like these fouls were marginal or anything.

Well, I just finished emailing about 100-120 athletic directors looking for nonconference games for 2006-07 and 2007-08. This is the time when I envy those of you that have an association handling your assignments.

[jeffpea]

Rich - I don't think you should feel bad about either situation. In most cases, when a game is a blow-out coaches tend to relax and return to their "normal self". Whether or not the compliment was 100% heartfelt, just accept it - while you may be a little skeptical of what a coach says, don't feel the need to verbalize your skepticism. Generally, when people are not emotionally involved in the outcome of a game, they tend to see that the officials really do a good job during the game.

As for the second instance, you know the coach has got to be frustrated and you're a convenient target. I would hope that you would expect some kind of comment from the coach when you've got his team down by 20pts AND you got a 9-1 foul count against his team. It sounds like you were aware of the lopsided foul count, but you should either try harder to find fouls on the winning team or expect to hear frustration-related comments from the losing coach.

Either way, these are not comments to get really upset about IMO. Sounds like you worked a good game and the better team won. Nice job!