How can officiating be fixed?

Dang.  Nice and succinct.  Occam's razor applied aptly.

Complete non-sequitur but this comment reminds me one of the funniest(and terrible) comments I've ever seen on this very board years ago when that nightmare of a scandal in Penn State was going on. 

There was a thread about large crowds of PSU students gathering to protest the firing of Joe Paterno, and in the comments a user said, 'These kids, they just don't get it.'

And someone replied: 'That's the thing, though, they kind of do get it....'

Seriously, do people really think Donaghy is the only ref who took money?  They are not infallible, they are human beings in striped shirts, with mortgages to pay, and children to take care of.

You just watch and hope the game doesn't have to be decided by them in the end.

Similarly there is this mind set that somehow things need to "even out". MSU fandom is always pointing out foul discrepancy. Did it ever occur to you that maybe one team is fouling more? (Hint: it's MSU)

Right. If a foul changes what would have likely happened, call it. A minor body bump that doesn't have any influence on the play, meh. Which is what sucked about Hunter fouling out. He gets called for a couple dumb things that had no impact on anything, but just because he can play through having someone draped over him, or slapping at him, or both, he doesn't get the call. If they weren't calling all the dumb things, OK, I guess.

However, I personally think it sucks when the game is all 'physical' like that. I'd rather it was more flowing like I remember the 80s - early 90s where even as a fan watching, it could move so fast I started to get winded (watch old vids of those Glenn Rice, Mills, Fab 5 teams move the ball. Damn, it was beautiful). But if it's called consistently, I can deal. This crap where one game it's a slugfest and the next there's a dumbass stoppage every 10 seconds sucks.

I wonder if that's somewhat responsible for the B1G's poor showing.  B1G basketball is very physical and many of these refs aren't having it.  Having a bunch of nickel dimers (as Bill Raftery would say) get called makes the game almost unwatchable to me.

I think on a subconscious level though a lot of refs know that there are a lot of eyeballs on them and can't help but try to seize the spotlight, especially if its a close game or a big upset.

Well said and agree. 

"I don't even think it's conscious, but you see one team get up 10 and the other team's coach is screaming at you that you're missing a bunch of calls (whether or not they actually exist) and you start "looking" for fouls."

This.

Look at the average NCAA official.  He's usually a white, mid-50's, not terribly athletic-looking dude.  I have always maintained they subconsciously favor the team full of "try-hards" because that's the team that they most identify with.  And when the score starts to get out of hand because one team is superior athletically they ALWAYS tend to try and "help" the lesser team by looking for fouls.  It happens in virtually every game at some point so this isnt an isolated situation.

In an odd way I think it actually speaks well of the officials desire to assist someone overmatched in a game even though it isnt fair for the better team.  And I dont think this can get fixed because how do you "fix" human nature?

I learned yesterday that it is acceptable to club a guy in the face as long as you block his shot first.

The main thing I've seen is the refs have been allowing really physical muggings in the paint, for the most part, but have been calling nickel and dime stuff on the outside.  The nickel and dime stuff outside really kills the flow of the game because that is where offenses typically set up on any given play.  Hunter was called for a couple of those, yet he gets bumped around on every post shot with no call.  I think Hunter's flagrant 1 was an example of his frustration with the non-calls.

Refs need to decide early on what their level of acceptable play is and stick to it throughout the game.

This is dead-on, but the problem is that if they call some tight fouls early on they have to stick with that and that's when everyone cries "refshow" even though they're doing exactly what they should be doing. They're just being consistent with what they called early on in the game.

I officiate middle school and some high school volleyball as well as club tournaments. The first call I make regarding a double contact or illegal contact (e.g. "lift") is the one that sets the tone for the rest of the game. Even if I wish later I hadn't made the initial call because now it means I have to call it that much tighter, I have to stay consistent.

So if the first foul or two the officials call are tight, they have to stick with it throughout or people will cry that things are one-sided. But if they call it tight throughout then people will cry that it's a refshow.

There's very little winning in officiating which is why officials are harder and harder to find these days. Nobody likes going out there, giving it their best (which I can promise you these officials are doing), knowing already in their minds what they missed or should have called differently and beating themselves up for it after the game, and then having everyone scream at them anyway for every call they didn't like.

I officiate because I love the game -- it's not even remotely about the pay for me, that's just a nice bonus -- but there are plenty of time where I'm up on the stand thinking, "I don't have to be doing this. I don't have to be up here with coaches screaming at me. I'm doing this because I enjoy it. If I stop enjoying it because coaches and fans make it a miserable experience I can walk away and my life will be just fine." I doubt I'm alone there which is why it's harder and harder to find officials today.

it's mostly that you can tell refs fall into this subconscious desire to see games be closer and they lose their consistency.  I don't even think it's conscious

Not to get all tin foil hat conspiracy theorist here, but the NCAA and the refs they employ have a very strong incentive to make games closer through officiating and even push for upsets because that gets more viewers and press

100% agree. Flow should be the #1 priority for basketball. I'm in favor of play on continuation with delayed foul calls for that reason. Too often a foul is called on what would be either a fast break or an easy layup/dunk. Why are we rewarding teams for a) disrupting flow, and b) poor defense? In the NBA it's become a toxic trend to just foul immediately after a TO just to stop a fast break. Basketball needs a play on foul system, not unlike soccer.

It is difficult, which is why we need to make it a full time job. The biggest problem with college refs is that we don’t pay them enough and don’t insist on making it a full time job.

In the NCAA, the refs are often not good and, worse yet, they are inconsistent from crew to crew, from conference to conference. The NCAA should take refs more seriously. One of the reasons the NFL is the most popular sport in America is because it is the best refereed. The NCAA has the money to make refs full time and train them in a uniform way, but they run it like a business rather than the nonprofit they claim to be.

Refs will never be perfect. As you point out, it’s a tough job. But college refs could be much better. 

My basketball coach had every single one of us ref a practice complete with harsh/over-the-top criticisms.  It is hard.  You absolutely cannot please everybody.  We all learned to respect the refs a little more because of it.

100% this. We have ever-more cameras, revealing ever-better slow-motion, from ever-more angles, but the referees don't have that. They have to call things immediately, often trying to judge fouls based on reactions (we can say they shouldn't do that, but we certainly do in screaming our outrage).

I think it's funny that fans of every sports league complain about the level of officiating in that particular league, without once seeming to recognize that everyone's saying that about every league. You think the fans of the Pac-12, or the NFL, are really happy with the officiating in those leagues? (They also say that it's "particularly bad now," without recognizing that people have been saying that all along. When were the glory days, exactly, when we all agreed officiating was really good these days?)

It is, admittedly, a frustratingly opaque and inconsistent (and often unfair) part of the game -- part of every one of these fast-moving and multi-person sports. But give me a break. I get so tired of the complaining about it.

I've officiated this game from the junior high to the college level. The higher/better the play the more easy to call the game-junior high is a friggin nightmare. 

OTOH, as a player I was taught how to play-to put the officials in jeopardy. Both defensively in impeding progress and offensively in initiating contact. 

I do not like how the games are being called-especially the charge/block. Either make the correct call regarding the initiation of contact or swallow your damn whistle and let whatever happens happen. If, as the official, you are working your angles correctly these calls are not as difficult to make as they are being made out to be.

As I have stated before, upwards of 90% of the officials I have worked with have not played the game enough to have developed a solid foundation from which to make a good call in those situations where we are intentionally being placed in jeopardy. Most have not even/ever started on a HS varsity team. They do, usually, know very well what the rulebook says...but they have no concept of the nuances. Bless their hearts for loving the game and being big fans...but maybe there should be a "have played the game" requirement for officials who call games where the stakes are what they are-in a tournament like this. 

Sorry Extra, got carried away...meant to only comment regarding the increased difficulty relative to the level of play.

#2 is first and foremost. Less calls are almost always better than more calls. Let guys play. 

I'd also add that if teams try to take advantage of that by uglying up the game--start being liberal with technical fouls. Officials need to use the tools they do have to control the game when necessary.

"Less calls are better than more calls."

Many defensive teams will abuse #2 because they know everything can't be called. It's why Sparty enjoys a bullshit advantage in Breslin.

100% agree on #1. A foul is a foul regardless of the game time or situation. You shouldn't be allowed to stop someone from hitting a winning shot by fouling them just because you "don't want the refs to decide the game." The player committing the foul decided the game by committing the foul, not the ref who accurately called it. 

I don't agree though that less calls are better if they are the right calls. Hacking and clutching and grabbing is ugly basketball. You should never be rewarded for that. 

I think there are two main rules / points of emphasis that would make a huge difference.  

1. Verticality. Call that accurately and you get way less calls and incentivize good defense. The only caveat to this is that if the offensive player slams into the gut of a defensive player who is vertical and that causes the players hands to come down, that should not be a foul on the defender.

2. Respect legal guarding position. Once an on ball defender establishes legal guarding position, they are allowed to move with the offensive player and they are allowed to have their space. If they reach, grab or initiate contact with the offensive player, it's a foul. But the offensive player initiating contact with a defender in legal guarding position should never be a foul on the defense. It doesn't necessarily have to be an offensive foul, but the defender should get their space.

Handle those two issues and I think games get a lot cleaner.