8A boys game last night. 24-4 at the half in favor of the visitors. Could've been (much) worse, but the visiting coach called off the dogs early. I'm wondering how some of you handle these games. For instance...

2nd half is more of the same, and I'm thinking, "How close do I call this????" End of 3rd quarter (home team now has 6 points), and home center (pudgy little kid) gets ball under his own basket. I'm lead. He travels to get up a really awful shot at the buzzer. He also gets clearly fouled. I hold my whistle on the travel thinking it would be nice for the kid to at least get off a shot. I also no-call the foul. Home coach asks me about it after the buzzer. I say, "I saw it coach, but I had just let your kid take a big travel to get off his shot, so I didn't call the foul." Coach didn't say any more.

I'm a rookie, so please don't hesitate to tell me if you think my philosophy is wrong. "Say what you mean, and mean what you say. Just don't say it mean." ;-)

In such a situation, I'm probably not going to call it any differently than you did. Quite honestly, both teams want the game over more than we do. I wouldn't have called the travel either. But I probably would call the foul. Now, you and I are probably going to get beat up for taking this stand by a select few. But this is an 8th grade game, right? There are those that will tell you that they all their games the same. And that's just horse $hit.

I agree with both of you philosophically. There are those that say call them all the same, but that is not the way I was taught.

The way I try to approach it is: remember you're not going to get in trouble for calling a foul, you can and will get in trouble for not calling a foul.

Call the violation
 

I was told this philosophy just last week. In a blow out, you can probably pass on some foul calls and the coaches will understnad. However, they would like for you to call all of the violations, because if you do not call them, it is hard to teach the players to do things the correct way.

I had not been using that plan before, but it makes sense. I do agree that you can pass on the marginal foul calls. Also, you may want to make sure that you referee to the skill level of the better team, as this MAY pick up the level of play of the lesser team.

Bench players.
 

Most of the time you are getting the players that do not play that much. So you have more sloppy game. But I thing that in essense you should call the same game. You do not want to be accused of doing anything to get a team back into the game by what you call. I think you really should not change that much, and if you do, realize that the players (most of the time) are not as skilled. So you holding the whistle a little longer is a must. You just do not want a lot of contact, and the contact affecting things and you do not call something, just because you wanted to get out of there. That looks really bad.

Peace

Really depends on what you are seeing. We played a strictly half court defense in a total mismatch (i.e., no press) and blew a team off the floor to the tune of 40-2. Nothing you can do, it's just that kind of game - I've pulled back, but I won't tell my players to stand there and let them score. Opposition got off maybe 5 shots the entire game.

Nitpicking violations on this team when they are so overmatched would do nothing for them half their shots came after travels that weren't called. Call the fouls, cause if you don't someone's gonna get hurt. But the refs told me at halftime that there may be a few more non-travels in the second half and not to worry - they just wanted to give this team a little space to play the game. I just asked them not to call the quick (and undeserved) foul on my team (that is a definite No-No), because fouling players out can change the game, and I don't want my players to get the wrong message on what is and is not a foul. But in this case, even that wouldn't have really mattered.

Excellent points! I appreciate all of the perspectives. In retrospect, I think I would still allow the travel but call the foul.

Thanks!

Here's how I have worked it out philosophically.

The team that's way up gains many advantages -- most of them are legal, but some aren't. Your job is to take away the illegal advantages. The team that's way down is going to do a lot of illegal stuff but it doesn't gain them much advantage, since they are so unskilled. So you call the worst of it, and let the rest go.

I disagree with Hawk's Coach about not fouling girls out, though. The coach I had once in this kind of game who asked me please to call the fouls on her girls even tighter looked at it like this: Here's a chance for my players to practice no-contact-at-all. If they can do it at this level, they'll be more able to move up to the next level and the next. She knew they would win, and wanted the girls to risk a little less contact, to see how to make that work.

At the level we play, non-contact is not an option, nor will it be as they move up. The game is physicial, and those who back off from it canot succeed at the higher levels. If my girls start backing off because of incidental contact being rules a foul, that would be detrimental to what I have taught them and how they need to play the game at higher levels, which is what I am really preparing them to do.

If it is a foul, by all means call it. But I have been in games where refs tried to help the team getting blown out by calling anything that looks like it might have had the possiblity of resembling a foul. I do not find that beneficial to my players, and will never find it beneficial.

I agree with this absolutely. Looking back at my post, I see that I didn't word it very well. The coach I talked to about this, said that some refs seem to take pity on the lesser team, and call it more loosely against them, and then call it more loosely against the stronger team -- apparently to keep it even or something. She didn't want this, but wanted to hold her players to a much higher standard, so they wouldn't become sloppy. I took her to mean I should call a foul on them if it would have been a foul at the state championship, even if I was letting this kind of contact go from the other team.

Rainmaker, we agree 100%. I always want tight calls on my team in these situations. Especially the violations, but also the fouls. If we overwhelm a team and are dumb enough to foul, we still have a lot to learn. And guess what - we still have a lot to learn cause it happens all the time.