I was not talking about the Penn State/Iowa game. I was talking about the Penn State/Michigan game. Joe Pa accused the officials for favoring Michigan, because I guess 4 of the officials lived in Michigan. Honig is a different story all together, he has had direct ties to Michigan. The officials that did the Penn State/Michigan game might have had no connection at all but living in the same state. Just because you live in the same state, does not mean that you favor that team. I know Big Ten Officials that live in Illinois and have done Illinois/Michigan games. I cannot think of a time that Illinois that got favortism their way. As a matter of fact, the famous Illinois/Michigan game were A-Train fumbled the ball and another controversial play took place, two of the officials were from Illinois. Illinois lost the game and eventually lost 4 or 5 straight. The crew chief of that crew was from Illinois and admittedly had a touch game and was not favoring either team.

Peace

Gee, even if one graduated from high school 36 years ago, as I did, you could not ref there?

Officials in SC are not assigned by a local association. If I'm not mistaken, the SCHSL makes all assignements. I would imagine that they simply make it a policy since they may otherwise not be familiar with individual situations.

A different issue is where an official works at a school. We havew quite a few officials who teach. We do not allow those officials to officiate a team from their school. I think would be a much greater conflict than having graduated from a school 20 or 25 year ago.

Working schools you attended.
 

I think if you attended a school, the main conflict should be if you still have an "association" with the school other than being an official. I went to HS as I said over 10 years ago. I have seen them play games several times. My former HS holds a Christmas Tournament every year and very popular in the in that part of Illinois. Most of the teams in that tournament are schools I have officiated extensively over the years. I have never worked this tournament yet, but if I did a game between my alma mater and another team, I might just know the people at the school better that I never attended than the school I graduated from. Of course people in my home town would know me, but so would the opposing team.

Peace

I think the real problem here is "Perception". None of the information about an official's background such as school affilitation is known until a situation in a game occurs which is more then likely controversial. Then the "Media" gets involved and that's when it get's out there. I personally believe if it can be done, meaning you have enough quality officials to put on games, you always avoid any of these types of situations. Because it will always come back to bite you in the ***! Now I'm personally a big Penn State fan as my father graduated from PSU and I follow football very closely. Do I believe those officials from Michigan cheated, HECK NO! But when it gets into the papers it looks bad and if it could have been avoided it should have been. Supervisors/Assignors are put in very tough spots at times and even they make mistakes. So my thought is if you have a high profile game no matter what sport you should always take into account what could happen and what could be perceived! If you don't it gives those media types and the public something else to look at even though you and I know officials don't cheat.

In my hometown, the Uncle and Nephew of the Girls' Varsity coach work his games. I don't think anyone knows the connection from out of town.

What do you want to happen? So you are saying that no Official can ever do any game in a state that they live? So we are not going to judge people on merit at all, but where they live? So any official in Illinois cannot do the Nortwestern and Illinois in any game? What about if I was born in Michigan and live in Illinois, does that preclude me from doing either team? The problem is that we are letting stupidity dictate policy. Officials have much more to worry about then trying to "cheat" for a team over another. Everything these guys do at the higher levels is highly scrutinized. If there was cheating if you will, it might be very easy to figure out. Not only that, we have not even talked about the guys that coaches do not like. Joe Pa would have never even tried to claim anything if his stupid team would have won the dumb game. I bet there have been Michigan officials on his other games with Michigan or Michigan State. Better yet, I bet Penn State has had Pennsylvania officials doing their games and they won and lost with them. You are right, maybe none of us should officiate anything because someone has a "perception" of anything. Maybe officials that were born in the same year with coaches should not officiate those games either.

Peace

For HS games, it should be pretty easy (in most areas) to schedule official around schools to which they have any connection, current or past.

While 99.9% of the time the official will work an unbiased and fair game, there will occassionally be an official that subconciously favors a team. It could be the team that he is/was connected with or it could be the other team as a result of trying to be fair but going to far.

The other issue is that someone will know about the connection and will suspect favoritism no matter how fair it is called. I suppose after enough time, there might not be anyone left who would know.

In the end, it's just easier to schedule around these game than it would be for the 1 time that it becomes an issue and the who association looses some credibility.

[Edited by Camron Rust on Nov 6th, 2002 at 03:44 PM]

I know I can call an unbiased and fair game and you know you can call an unbiased and fair game. But the thing I have found when interviewing fans and players about a certain game that they lost is that the official was biased. I remember one fan asked what the official saw out there and the person sitting next to her said, "Friends and neigbors." So to avoid the apperance of bias, we must take steps to insure we are not officiating games that involve and Alma Mata, our Kids, our grandkids(not mine), wife's alma mata, our job, our wife's job. There are enough schools that you don't have an emotional interest in that you don't need to be officiating schools where you do have an intrest.

You guys are certainly entitled to your opinion. No quarrel there. But you can't legislate what others do. If you see it as a problem, don't do it. But it's not a black and white, right or wrong issue. It's gray. If I get booked, I'll continue to go.

I think I Have some of you beat. My wife and I don't have any children, so that is not a worry. However, I will not be assigned any of her games as she is the Varsity Girls Basketball coach in the area. How would THAT be for a tough crowd?

In our assoc. we don't work H.S. where we have children there because a few years ago in a playoff game in another sport a official made a controversial call in favor of a sc hool where his uninvolved daughter attended.Of course a few of the parents knew this and screamed to high heaven.So now just to avoid appearences we don't do that anymore.We don't worry about alma maters unless you have a direct connection there.I find hard enough to officiate without trying to help a team win.

Ouch...be fun to call a T on her, wouldn't it!! It is interesting to me that even though we as officials go WAY out of our way to avoid "conflicts", they still come up...I was on the court for warm-ups at a local boys HS Varsity game several years ago - the Home AD walks by me and says "Remember you're at Prairie tonight, not Battle Ground" (the two are same school district rivals)...I looked at him and said "What are you talking about?" He responded that he knew I graduated from BG and didn't want me to let that influence the way I called the game (yes they were playing each other)...I smiled and said "Sir, I grew up in a small town in Alaska, graduated from a small HS in Alaska, and moved down here after I got married." He just looked at me and said "Oh. Never mind"...the fans are gonna think what they want to think. Do your games, be professional, and ignore the fans...

I disclose my connections to my assignor, and let him decide what games I do.

However, there are have been a couple times I have reffed a game that involved people I knew well, where I ddin't like the results afterwards. So now when I fill out my "Disclosure" form at the beginning of the season, I say to myself, "what relationships can withstand these pressures?" It helps me decide which games I will refuse.