you are not there to please anyone
 

I hate having partners who like to please everybody in the gym.
people often forget why they are there. Your job as ref is to call the game and if you are going to ignore rules just because the whole crowd in the gym including the janitor is going to hate you well then don't ref. Sometimes we have to make hard decisions that lead to people hating you but HEY YOUR A REF nobody will ever like you.

I had club ball tournament game once with young kids and in this tournament they did not allow for the kids to play zone or double team ( under 12 tournament) If they do so they get first warned then a technical. Both teams had a warning... with 6 seconds to go blue is up by one green has ball just underneath basket and guarded by a blue player.. second blue player comes and steals ball . TWEET double teaming technical foul 2 shots PLUS ball .. kid sinks both blue had no chance... blue coach lined up his players in tears right in front of me so i could see them crying because it was ALL MY FAULT. All I said to him was well now you know what you are going to be working on in practice coach.

I felt horrible but i left the gym knowing that I did my job and knowing that I did not screw over the green team by NOT making that call.