NCAA officials

[pizanno]

The recent GEO/NOVA & TENN/RUTG discussions, brought up something that I wrestle with throughout the season, and am interested in comments:

Some conferences out here have very different styles and philosophies when it comes what is a foul, or sometimes even floor mechanics, despite continued efforts to standardize it via the manual and ESO video updates.

Do others feel it's more important to officiate how the NCAA dictates in the manuals, or how the indiviual supervisors want?

Some examples:

* one supervisor hates "and 1s" and would (when possible) rather we wait until we can see if the ball goes in before a whistle. Another says, a foul is a foul...we can't predict whether the ball will go in.

* Officiating from the Trail on the court vs. trail staying off the court - let the C help. Two conferences, two styles.

* One says to say as little as possible to coaches vs. one wants you to develop a good repoire with them by chatting them up.

I think I do pretty well managing going back and forth between various confs, and know that if I DON"T do it the way my sups want it on a given night, I can't expect to continue working for them.

When situations like GEO/NOVA & TENN/RUTG occur, it's often a lively debate about what the call "should be", but based upon what and who's opinion?

I know what the rule book says, but what does the supervisor say? It has to be publicly defendable and supported by the rules (as I think both plays were), but is it a call (or no-call) that is the "right" call in the sups mind?

I'm wondering if this also happens in other areas of the country. I'm also probably venting because I'm in the minority opinion about the merits of calling the Stokes foul!

[Back In The Saddle]

Unless I am badly missunderstanding how things work...

Hammerin' Hank is trying hard to standardize stuff. But NCAA refs don't work for him. They are independent contractors work for supervisors (and must be re-hired every year). Supervisors work for conferences, which, unless I miss my guess, really comes down to coaches and AD's and occassionally college presidents (when somebody really gets a bee in their bonnet over something).

So Hank can say what he likes. But he doesn't hire officials and he doesn't write paychecks. So refs answer to supervisors and supervisors answer to conferences. And so successful college officials do what their supervisors tell them. Until the tournament. But even then, the list of officials Hank gets to use comes from the conferences.