question from a layman

[LGK]

I attended a tournament this past weekend in Texas, a major high stakes event. As with all games each team’s supporters cheered the calls for their team while vocalizing against the calls against their team. As a parent supporting one of the teams I typically give the officials the benefit of the doubt. I am not a very vocal parent I just don't want anyone to get hurt when/if the game gets out-of-hand.

This game was not being called correctly. I note this with some certainty as I was sitting near three licensed officials who were themselves appalled with the calls to the point of vocalizing corrections and suggestions to the court officials. I do not know all the technical aspects of officiating, but I was made aware of the areas of the floor each official is responsible for and that the officials were apparently calling fouls out of their areas. I digress.

The point everything came to light about a possible problem with officiating was when one of our players fouled out, late in the third quarter, the first time that ever happened all season. Our coach tried to take the thirty seconds he was entitled to at that point when the official stated that this was "Not a NCAA game". The official was told that the tournament was being run according to a specific rule book that noted a team has thirty seconds after a member fouls out to make changes. He was completely unaware that the tournament was following that book.

My issues are that the official was allowing hard fouls where it is a miracle that no one got hurt, that he did not even know the book the tournament was following which could explain the bad calls, and that as our team was fighting back closing the point gap our top scorers fouled out because of this one officials calls.

What recourse does a spectator have? Official protests will be filed, but what can a parent do? I understand that the officials are human and make mistakes, but this same official made calls that “robed” another team of a win according to the same three officials I noted earlier.
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