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My rough game this year...
I've done pretty well this year, especially considering how little I reffed the last two years, and how .... uh.... unreliable my own mental state has been until recently. But tonight.... ugh...
Freshman girls. It's all I've done all season, and that's been fine, but tonight was your classic awful freshman girls game. 137,387 fouls, and those are just the ones we called. If the coaches had had their way, we'd have called another 200,000 or so. Both coaches knew little snippets and phrases from the rule book, but without knowing all the details of how those ideas applied to the actual rules. So V35 reaches in with marginal contact, pries the ball loose, H22 goes after the ball, as does V35. If V35 had backed off a little and just let H22 get the ball, I'd have let them play on, but V35 went after the ball right through H22, who fell to the floor. I had a good angle and saw the whole play and called the foul. Coach says, "But they had equal opportunity for the loose ball." So how do I explain all the reasons why that doesn't apply here (V35 initiated contact, H22 had possession, and didn't need to relinquish her "rights", V35 didn't allow the opportunity to remain equal, but created an illegal advantage for herself...) It was like that the whole game. Visitors were clearly the better team and they won by 30 or 40, I don't remember, but they were playing very aggressively and Home had no skill, and every little bump created a huge disadvantage for them. We let a lot go, but even so, visitors has two players foul out and three or four more with 4 fouls by the end of the game. And of course it was all because we didn't have a clue. Home had one very tall girl with absolutely no skill whatsoever. Couldn't dribble, pass, catch, shoot or guard. Gorgeous, really tall and great personality, but bball is definitely NOT in her future!! But she made our afternoon more difficult. Otherwise home team could do really well, when there was no defense but didn't know how to suck it up and play through the legal defense. Fumbled A LOT, Bad passes, blocking errors, etc etc. Home coach thought every little mistake was always because of a foul, but most weren't. And then the girls would have great defensive position, be ready to totally block a shot, and then swing their arms and hit the shooter! AUGH!!! And table.... don't even get me started. Just plain awful. Partner showed up late... and then it turned out he was .... well, let's say he made me look like a wispy little thing (which I absolutely am not!). He didn't do too badly, except that he kept calling oob when the ball hit the side of the backboard, and when he first got there, his second call got changed by home coach. He was nice enough, and had pretty good judgment, but was definitely a ball watcher, and didn't hesitate to call things right, right in front of me. I made two pretty bad mistakes, one in the middle of the second quarter (that one had help from my partner and the table), and then one just into the third quarter. I was able to get them straightened out and they had absolutely no impact on the game, but really made me look bad, especially to the V coach, who took it in the shorts both times. Oh, well, can't win them all. It's gotta be better next time, right? I mean, right? The good parts were that I kept my head and didn't lose my temper, I was able to deflect and prevent some pretty ugly attitude problems, and I didn't mess up any rules. I'm especially proud of these two things, since I was worried in November about forgetting the rules (two years off) and I've had temper problems for years. So it wasn't a totally awful afternoon. Just long and difficult. Okay, dokey. I'm done venting. On to the next game Friday! |
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Your partner wasn't Mark by chance? |
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My only point was that she had lots and lots of good things about her, but one of them wasn't basketball! |
Juulie - everyone has games like this. It doesn't matter what level, it's just part of basketball. The only thing we can do is learn from the experience. Just like you are doing, we can analyze the good and the bad, and what we could've done differently. Maybe there was a play we could've called differently had we been in a different position. Maybe there's something we should've said, or not said, to a coach or player. Each one of those ugly plays that we see help to hone our decision-making skills so we get more of those calls and no-calls "correct" in the future.
Maybe after 3, 5, or 10 years, when we have the same ugly game again, it may go a little smoother because we are a little better. But, it will still be an ugly game. There will still be semi-clueless coaches. And it will probably still not feel right when you get done. But it's still basketball - one of the better games around. And we get to be a part of it. How cool is that? :) |
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