Hey guys had a 7th grade boys game. Both teams really bad and trying to play a type of game they were not skilled enough to play. To make a long story short in the early part of the game, the ball was loose on the floor alot and guys were flying everywhere. To make matters worse their was lots of contact everywhere however very few fouls. The away coach was on us for this and i told him that contact does not = foul. Well he called a time out and begins talking with the home coach. I came over and said coaches talk to your team. They both then said lets talk. My first mistake but me and my partner lisented to them because they were polite about it. But the away coach said " I don't care about the game I just want to make sure my players stay safe, so can you please slow the game down" I shoulda said well coach then just forfit. But i said coach it is your job to have your players play under control. Well the game went on and the coaches continued to get on us about this since they game wasnt getting any cleaner. At half time me and my partner talked. We decided to retell the coach we are only going to call a foul if their is a foul. After we did that we called the captains over and said " Guys your coachs are made that this game is so physical, since they rn't doing anything it about if you want your coachs to be happy talk to your team and tell them to calm it down. Well that didn't help and the game was physical. What else could we have done? I think we did a good job handling it. Any critics?

I have some comments.

All contact is not a foul, I agree but don't try and say this to a coach. It's just going to get you in trouble. If he asks you a question about a specific play then try and explain why you didn't call a foul (ie there was minimal contact). I think comments like "Not all contact is a foul" may come off as a smart *** response (JMO). I would have told the coach we are looking for fouls to call.

If you feel you were calling all the fouls that were there then I may have just told the coaches "both teams are hustling and playing hard. I don't want to hear this brought up again. Thanks."

Thanks for the advice I'll store that just in case I need it again

Fonzzy...you might want to adjust your philosophy on "not all contact is a foul", for a 7th grade game. This may be a good philosophy for a upper level, skilled team, that is strong enough to play through some contact. But, for a bunch of unskilled 7th graders that are out there running around and into each other...maybe heed the coaches' advice...calling a foul on a kid that displaces another player, could be seen as a disadvantage, couldn't it? ;)

Fair enough, however it was things like 6 kids in a big circle going up for rebounds, or they would be tied up for a jumpball and their was some swinging going on. Stuff like that. We called the basic stuff, the blocks, charges, the shot fouls ect. In fact both teams were in the double bonus in both halfs, we had something like 52 fouls. It was just a messed up game

52 fouls and they were asking for more? Sheesh, there was a very obvious problem here and it wasn't the officiating! Only thing you can do in a game like this is get in, get it done & get out......

I agree in theory, Tim, but I do think that it's possible that if they'd called it tighter early on, there wouldn't have been as many. Especially since both coaches were asking for that. If both coaches say it to me together and politely, I'm grateful, because it gives me a chance to crack down and really participate in teaching the kids something. For the next 5 minutes of play after the coaches say this, call everything. Everything. and then see how the kids adjust. It might be that the second half would look a lot like real basketball.

I'm talking 7th grade here, though. I wouldn't necessaryily do this at the varsity level, especially not boys.

That is all I needed to read. Stop giving coaches at this level more credit than they deserve. If they were that good of a coach or that advanced as a coach, they usually would not even be coaching these kids. Of course there are exceptions, but I can only think of one varsity coach that at the same time coached the varsity while he was coaching the local JH team.

Everyone is learning and coaches are learning just as the officials are. Do not expect them to understand what your role is as an official or to expect them to understand the rules any better than HS or college coaches. Our state rules meetings require high school representatives to attend meetings about the new rules. Junior High coaches do not fall under the same requirement. I did a JH game right before the season and the JH coaches did not even know there was a new team control foul rule. So you have to approach these games with an understanding that much of the yelling is not very educated.

Fozzy, you did fine. Just do not expect that these coaches are going to have a major understanding of the game, the players or what you do as an official. You just want to hustle, do the best you can and that is all most officials should expect.

Peace