Horrible display of sportsmanship

[CMHCoachNRef]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

JRut,
You are correct when identifying the quality of some middle school game basketball officials. If I were doing this game, the player likely would not have gotten to this point. I am more tolerant of behavior than most. At the same time, players don't generally act like this during a middle school game. This type of behavior is usually reserved for the AAU/Ohio Youth Basketball post-season.

It is quite ironic that I am tolerant of this behavior as an official. As a coach, my players were NEVER allowed to say ANYTHING to an official, an opponent, an opposing coach, an opposing parent (or one of our parents) during a game. They were permitted to say "yes sir" or "no sir" in response to an official's question and that was it. No "palms to the heavens", no shaking heads, no smart comments, etc. As soon as they did, they came out of the game.

The only problem I see with what happened here is that next week the officials will likely not be as lenient and forgiving. While I do not like to give a middle school player a technical foul, I will certainly talk to him about his behavior. Generally, the player is only trying to see where the line will be drawn. Once I draw it -- and they sense I am serious about it -- they tend to stop it.

In this case, the player seemed to keep up the behavior after "the referee talked to the player during a free throw." While we do not know what the official said to the player, it is possible that the official did not take the next step after the behavior continued.

I have suggested to many new officials to be more tolerant of complaints when they first start because the complaints are probably accurate. At the same time, when a 14 year old starts showing up an adult official, action needs to be taken.

As a former coach, I would certainly hope that the coach takes the action. If he does not, I quite possibly have already spoken to the coach about the fact that one of his players is close to crossing the line. It appears as though the officials had multiple opportunities to take this step. If the coach takes no action, the technical should come as no surprise. In most cases, the coaches are generally happy to get the warning and take action on their own without the officials having to do anything else.

It appears as though a situation was escalating here and the officials -- experienced or not -- took no action.