TPM #251: Reaction to Referee’s Call a Sign Of What is Wrong With Youth Sport.

The Women’s College basketball championships have brought exciting moments, including this one: a measuring stick on our perspective towards competition.

Welcome to edition #251.  Into April already??? Wow, time sure does fly.

This week I am absolutely thrilled to be dissecting a competitive situation at college basketball’s highest level.  Not just because it is basketball, but because it is Women’s Basketball.  Why?

Because no one is talking about it being the women’s game. No one is talking about it not being as interesting as the men’s game or any other BS that has been bandied about for years.

For those stuck in a time capsule, women’s sport is just as entertaining as any men’s sport.  If you don’t think so, then you are not watching the tennis, golf, basketball, soccer, ice hockey and volleyball I am.   Incredible skill, with just as much dedication and perseverance (if not more) than any of the men’s sports.   Yes, the skill level is different in some respects.  For example, women are not dunking the ball regularly, but the case can be made that the fundamentals in women’s basketball are better.  That the team play is better (across multiple sports).   Ok, let’s park that for now.  

Back to reaction the topic du jour.

Specifically, Friday night in the national semi-final. Close game. :10seconds left. Foul gets called on offensive player (U Connecticut).  It turns the ball over to Iowa who finishes up for the win.

The foul call itself, was a foul. It was an illegal screen that gave the offensive team an advantage that could have led to a score that would have put U Conn in the lead.   Many experts have weighed in. It was a foul and should have been called.

The outcry however has been massive.   “The ref made a horrible call considering the time of the game” is the general sentiment.

If you have coached, watched, participated and/or officiated for any length of time you likely have an opinion about what should happen at the end of a close game.   Many think that the referee should put their whistle away and “let the players” decide.

In some elite sports that is exactly the mentality, and it is very flawed.

The reality is, at that level, the officials are highly skilled, as the players are. They have studied the game and rule book more than anyone else in the building.  They get to that level based on merit.  They are there to arbitrate so no side gets unfair advantage.  Most of the time, nothing gets noticed (an indication of doing a good job). Sometimes, they have to make decisions at critical times of the game.

The line of thinking that the referees should disappear at the end of the game is exactly like saying that it is the teachers that fail students in school.  While there are exceptions, the general rule is players decide the game and students decide their grades.

Why should a team get an advantage by playing outside the rules?

In this case, the call was controversial only because of the emotion from both sides and their supporters.

The reaction to the foul call was a good reflection of how biased and emotional everyone views the heat of the battle.  To the point, where the young guard on Iowa received hate messages for trying to battle through the screen.

In this time of everyone having a platform, the ability to deliver messages is unparalleled.

The classiest of the bunch, and the type of person we should be showing our kids is the U Conn guard Paige Bueckers who took ownership for the loss.

“Everybody can make a big deal about that one single play but not one single play wins a basketball game or loses a basketball game.  I believe I made a lot of mistakes that could have prevented that play”.

What?

Now this is the leadership we want sport to represent.

This is perspective and honesty from a 22-year-old, a few moments from a devastating loss.

Taking ownership.

Accountability.

That is what sport should be teaching us. 

Not to blame the officials or anything else.

No wonder officials are dropping out of the game at record rates.

If this is a measuring stick of how competition is viewed in our culture when it does not go our way, we have a broken system.

We can do better.