It's not about he said/she said.

Consider this - if a T is appropriate in this situation, could it be applied fairly? We are not equidistant from the opposing locker room - such a ruling would inherently favor one team over the other much of the time. If you heard home team coach yelling all this - how do you know visitor team coach wasn't also saying the same thing?

And how do you know, positively, that it was head coach? Could be anyone in that room. Heck ... it COULD be a fan whose seat happens to be directly above you, or someone's dad who happens to be in the locker room for whatever reason. Or the janitor.

We have a couple of schools that put us into the coaches office in the middle of the locker room. If he directly confronts us in there, there's no one around but us and his players. I'm still calling that T.

Please. Most of the time, we know his voice. Further, if it's perfectly clear that he's doing that passive aggressive "I was talking to my players" BS, the visiting coach isn't guilty because we can't hear him. It's a cop out.

Again, I'm not calling this T, but I don't want to pretend we can't, either.

I would not be so sure. I try often to not talk to coaches and half the time I do not know their names. But then again I might not see a coach for years so to suggest all of us would know their names is not really the case. And it could be possible that he was an angel during 1st half too, which would make this conversation even more muddied.

And I think MD makes a great point. But the "Silence cannot be misquoted" can be applied to coaches too. He he does not want any retribution, then he has to watch what he says. I am just saying that based on my experiences and confrontations I have had with coaches on the court, I would pass on this situation when those situations caused controversy.

I had a situation a couple of years ago where I got blamed for a T given for uniforms and I was not even the calling or ruling official that gave this coach a T. And the coach lied and suggested I was "mad" at them because they had a T given to them because of a uniform violation. And that situation took place all on the court and led to a situation where the coach accused me of confronting him after a rather inappropriate comment.

Now where I live almost ever T has to be reported to the assignor. And if we gave a T for what took place in the locker room, I would not be comfortable for that being the reason.

Peace

Neither would I, but I would be perfectly comfortable putting that bit into the report I write for the T I give in the third quarter.

Full Support ...
 

Agree. In the case of my assignment commissioner, I know, for sure, that he will be calling the athletic director the next morning.

People sound significantly different when shouting in anger than they do when conversing or even raising their voice a bit. There's no way you can be positive it's him. You can be very sure ... but positive? I doubt it.

Sure enough to call the T? Yep. Not that I would, but I reserve that right.

I disagree.

A similar concept came up several years ago involving coaches cursing in the huddle during a time-out.
Several officials took the stance to stay out of it and not penalize what goes on in the team huddle. The NFHS then issued a ruling stating that the team huddle was not a safe zone for coach and that inappropriate language needed to be penalized. Furthermore, it didn't matter whether the language was directed at his own team or the officials.
Make your own comparison with the lockerroom situation.

If I can hear a coach cursing in his huddle from my timeout spot 20-30 feet away, then it sounds like the coach has violated the "Public" P.

This is tough. There is a (black) coach in my area who sometimes refers to his (almost all black) players with various racial references. As an official, am I supposed to penalize the way the coach interacts with his players? As I understand it, most officials (I've never worked there) leave it alone.

In one of my games I saw a coach slam his whiteboard on the ground during a timeout. I knew it wasn't because of the officiating, he was angry at his team. I left it alone. Tough decisions.