And - you can get it to turn on in your bedroom, unlike a wife.

Man - I am soooooo dead.

Enough fun. The only DIII DII basketball in Colorado is RMAC. There are a few officials that work the Jayhawk league in Colorado. Not that many. You will have to work very hard to make those rosters. I just moved from Colorado and I can give you the straight skinny. If you can, get to Al English's camp this summer. He is one of the top assignors in the area. If he assigns you for varsity, you have a good start and he doesn't assign anyone he hasn't seen work. Yes, Denver is short on officials and big on growth. Visit the officiating page at http://www.chsaa.org to find the list of Area directors for where you are going to live in Colorado. Contact a Area director to find out what you need to do to get started. Denver is by far the biggest area with 250 officials but since I have seen them work I know that not everyone who gets a varsity game is good. They need good officials. You will have to pay your dues. If you only get two varisty games your first year, consider yourself lucky. Also, read my article written last december at officiating.com. It tells of my experience transfering into the Denver area.

Tim,
What years were you there? I was there for three years, (1995-1997) and really enjoyed officiating there. I went to Al's camp and worked with him, Jim Dorsey, Hal Kay, etc.

Thanks for the info. I went to the web page and looked at the stuff there, but I am confused about how this system works. What, exactly, do the area directors do? Who handles the assigning of games. If they are in such need of good officials, why would one be lucky to only get two varsity games?(assuming that the person is a good ref capable of doing that level of ball) Does it help to know anyone in Denver (I know a few people there who I believe would vouch for me) or is there a "try-out" opportunity? Honestly, working a schedule of non-varstiy games is not exciting to me.

Do you know when Al English (is he the former silky smooth shooter for the Nuggets?) holds his camp and where?

I was there between 97 and 2001. Four years. The system is this. You join the IAABO board 4. Vote last month and they decided to stay affiliated with IAABO. The area directors are the chapter leaders for that area. They are your contacts to get into the system. As far as assigning games goes. Each conference has its own assignor. Al English is one of them. They assign Varsity and in some cases subvarsity games. The assigning of varsity is an honor that is given when you earn it. In Denver, subvarsity is assigned by the volenteer system. In other words, you show up for a meeting and someone will have a list of all the games available and you will sign your name into a slot. Remember the more of those slots you fill in the first year, the more they will fill you in for varsity the next year. So the assigning process will be an excercise in schedule management. Good luck and let us know how it goes.

As far as Al English's camp goes. I did not get any liturature on it this year. I would ask your area director if he knows or even if Al's phone is in the web site under assignors. You could call it and ask him directly.

[Edited by Tim Roden on Apr 23rd, 2002 at 09:40 PM]

Thanks Tim.

BTW, can one choose to work boys or girls games exclusively?

[Edited by stripes on Apr 24th, 2002 at 10:52 AM]

No, in fact, there is a requirement that you work so many girls games before you are allowed to call a boys playoff game. Besides, the girls ball is better than the boys ball some nights with teams like Highlands Ranch.

Does this rule work in reverse? Can one work girl's playoffs without working boy's games? If one is willing to forego the playoff games, can one gender's games be avoided?

It is hard to avoid 100%. At the subvarsity level, You will be asked to do boy/girl double headers. Even A and AA ball has a lot of boy/girl double headers for varsity. I know of no one that has tried to avoid one or the other. There are several officials that because of age and ability will get all girls games for varsity but have a mixed subvarsity schedule. I know of no one that has an all boys schedule for varsity.