First Year: First Game From Hell...
 

As some of you know this is my first year working HS basketball. Well today I had the dreaded game from hell. I have read numerous other posts about the same thing from many of you, but my game had me thinking about a bunch of questions. I hope you guys can help me out.

This game was a Freshmen Girls game.

First of all to start this game I had a bad feeling driving to the gym, not sure why, just did. Got to the gym 30 minutes before a 3:30 start. Sat around waiting for my partner who I know, and is a nice guy but have never worked with him before. 10 minutes on the clock and he is still not there. I call him (again) and finally get a hold of him and he tells me that he is about 5 minutes away. I ask him if he wants me to do conduct the pre-game meeting so when he gets here we can get going, he says no he wants to be there. That is just fine with me, he is the R, I'll follow his "orders".

He shows up with less than 2 on the clock, we have the meeting and away we go. We have a held ball off of the opening tip. V grab the ball and within a second H grabs the ball creating our first held ball of the game. We award the ball to H, and give the arrow to V. Was this correct?

Both teams are full court pressing which is leading to numerous turnovers, and a lot of slapping fouls by the home team. We are trying to keep things even, but it's out of control. V are in the double bonus with 90 seconds left in the first quarter. Obviously the H coach is complaining as are the fans in this terribly cramped gym.

We make it to half time with out more incident, and the 3rd quarter goes as smooth as we could have hoped. 4th quarter comes, and it just falls apart.

The H team starts slapping again and we start calling the fouls. Of course the fans and the H coach do not like what is happening. Meanwhile they are climbing back into the game and are within 4, after being down double digits all day. After my partner calls a reach-in foul on H, their coach starts screaming at him.

She did not get personal with him, or use any vulgarities, but she was going off. I was waiting for him to T her up, and he never did. It was so bad that I was trying to figure out if I can step in and T her up even though I wasn't the official getting yelled at. Is that appropriate? I didn't want to show up my partner, but something had to be done. I stepped in and tried to bait her into yelling at me so I could T her up, but she sat down when I got in there.

Anyways game ended and we got out of there without much more incident, but it was by far the worst game of my "career".

Sorry for the long post, but I had to rant about it. I have put all my questions in italics, any help would be great.

Thanks in advance!

A) Welcome to the real world!! We all have these games, and we all learn something from them, and do better next time. Good job getting out with your shirt still on, and some sense of equilibrium!

B) You can call a T, when your partner is getting reamed, but generally it's better to let him handle it. Unless it's just taking too much time and interfering with the conduct of the game. Then you just have to take charge and tell P later that you're going to e-mail Jurassic to send P a copy of his official "Grow a pair" lecture.

C) Don't EVER bait a coach for any reason. It's never worth it. Never.

D) Don't apologize for ranting to us. That's what we're here for.

PS I won't even TRY to answer the jumpball/heldball question. I'm just glad it hasn't happened to me.

on the opening tip, a held ball you do a jump between the two girls who got it. Re-jump with new jumpers.

oh and on T's give a warning if you have to but after T them up. I learned from my first year that you need to call them if you have to and don't be hesitant either. If they cross the line T them up. I didn't my first year sometimes and it was a mistake but just learn from it and you will be better off.

Sounds like one team might have had possession before the held ball? I can't tell how long V had the ball before H grabbed it.

Other than the held ball to start the game (Case Book 6.4.1 Sit C) most of the statements in your OP look like judgement calls. HTBT.

Keep studying the rules, keep gaining experience and this type of game will rarely happen.

To me it doesn't sound like it was controlled simultaneously. Sounds like V had control then H came in and controlled it along with V. Therefore, arrow is set to H and we have our first held ball - H's ball.

My partner and I both felt that V controlled the ball and that the H player was able to create a held ball after a second or two. V Coach asked for an explanation, but had no problem with what I told him.

Then you ruled correctly.

When you say "trying to keep things even," if you mean the foul count, that ain't part of your job.

Don't worry about it. There's nothing you can do about crappy teams that can't walk and chew gum at the same time. I had a Boys JV, GV, and BV tonight and both teams in each game were flat out awful. It was hard to concentrate during the third game because we called probably 60 fouls because of how rough both teams were. Just keep working on mechanics and you'll be fine.

Had a VG game, (not very competitive) where teams were over aggressive at their attempts to reach in and got arm, time after time. My partner works some D2 and expressed to me during a timeout, he was getting tired of their fouling and hoped it would change. It didn't and finally after calling a reach he said with a little disgust, "QUIT FOULING!" By far the most memorable thing from that game but can't say that it helped any.

Been there, done that! We probably all have. As has been said by others - some games just can't be helped.

I had a horrible run-in with a coach my first yr. Really got me down.

Put it behind you and don't let it get you down. In a while this will just be one of many games that helps mold you into the official you want to become. Just another notch in your toolbelt. Live and learn. NEXT!

Back when I was coaching, I'd be pretty upset too if an official called a "reach-in" foul.

Also, you got the jump ball sitch right, and while I probably HTBT, good job passing on the T your partner didn't want to call.

I certainly appreciate everyone's response. I definitely will learn from this experience and hopefully it will make me a better official in the long run.

Don't worry, you'll have worse games than this as you move on. :D You're doing the right thing, you're taking a bad night at the office and learning from it. It sounds like you got everything correct from a rules stand point, but it does sound as though your partner took too much from the coach. Maybe something good for you to think about is what you would have done if you were the one standing there taking it from the coach?