JustRules

We need to get away from using the word "robbed" in situations like this. It implies the official intentionally made the call incorrectly to benefit Purdue. That questions the credibility of the officials and calling him a cheater. That is absolutely not true. This is a judgement call and it's perfectly understandable to disagree with the judgement. The proliferation of this kind of accusation by players, coaches, fans, and media indirectly contributes to the departure of younger officials and leading to a shortage. If you don't see the connection between comments like this and youth games having to be cancelled or high school varsity games being moved to Thursday or Saturday then I'm not sure I can hlep you. This is such a valid point. I've seen arguments like this posted on line and shared by so-called experts (didn't help the live announcers used it as a point). When I see someone using this argument to indicate it should have been a TD they lose any credibility with me. At least know the rules if you are going to voice your opinion of the call. Progress is as much an art as a science. There are is absolute or black and white on this. There are key things you try to use to apply it consistently but those aren't absolutely either. For example, if he's still churning his feet you let it go. But in this case he's lying on top of a defender and I don't think he's feet are giving him much leverage. This official was in this game for a reason (this was the #3 bowl game for the ACC including the national championship next week) and the covering official was in the NFL development pool. He's more than qualified to make this call and was very confident in making the call. I'm good with that. But this wasn't an obvious call either way. You are not incorrect to argue he could have let it play out. That brings up another issue listed below. You can PUSH a runner or pile, but you can't PULL a runner. It's a rare call because it rarely happens and if you are going to call you need to make sure it's huge. On a 4th down play in OT it really needs to be huge. Did it truly impact the play? If you are going to let it play out here and you feel that pull allowed the runner to extend his arm with the ball then you can absolutely flag it here. If they had ruled TD and flagged him for assisting the runner, UT gets to replay the down from the 6. If you are flagging it you are saying the only reason UT scored was because his arm was pulled enough to free it to extend to the goal line. So UT benefits by getting another down even though they were stopped short and committed a foul that led to a score. If that happened and UT scores on the replay of the down it wouldn't have surprised me to see a call for assisting the runner to become a loss of down penalty. The other things I this this shows in regards to progress though is this player pulling him doesn't help get his body any further forward. That's a pretty good indication his progress is stopped. That's why I think from an analysis standpoint watching the replay multiple times I like the call made on the field. It's not an invalid argument to say his progress wasn't stopped and continue to let it play out. But only one opinion ultimately matters. If this official is hired by the NFL in the next couple years we'll know the powers that be are good with his judgement.

I expect that once they decide to go beyond 4 teams the idea of neutral sites (especially using bowls) will move to hosted sites. Expecting a team's fans to travel to a conference championship game, and 3 playoff games will be very difficult. Having 3 week of playoff games will take more attention and interest away from the lower tier bowl games. If there are 12-16 playoff teams the interest in the lower bowls will be even less, and I don't see how they remain. Ultimately an expanded playoff will result in a decision to move from a bowl postseason to a playoff postseason. A 16-team playoff system doesn't assume all 16 teams have a realistic chance to win the championship. We don't have that expectation for the 68 teams in the basketball tournament or the 14 teams in the NFL playoffs. For some teams it will be considered a success to make the playoffs and have a crack against one of the top teams. For some teams it will be a great accomplishment to be the 11th seed and beat the 6 seed on the road. The championship team will likely come from the top 4-6 teams which is fine. I love the bowl games so I'm perfectly fine with the current set up. The fact that players are opting out of the games to prepare for the NFL (I don't fault them at all) shows the importance to many has become much less. I think it's time to scrap bowls and go to an expanded playoffs like FCS, D2, and D3 do.

The HCAC has 6 crews so 42 staff officials. I would estimate about half of them still work on a HS varsity crew and some of them are in Ohio. Some of the others keep their HS license but aren't likely to work HS sub-varsity any longer. There are also 20-25 D1/D2 officials and some of them still maintain a HS license to work an occasional HS varsity game. There are also 10-15 HCAC applicants who may keep their Saturdays open to tag along with a college crew or be available in case there are last minute needs for subs. With over 900 licensed HS officials the impact of the college officials is minimal.

In this case I'm not sure what the reasoning is for not allowing a kicking team member to advance a kick. The only exception is a scrimmage kick recovered by the kicking team behind the neutral zone. I've never heard the logic of there being no defense to stop them on a punt (scrimmage kick). I don't see that logic because there's no defense to stop them on a sack/fumble either. My assumption is it's related to intentionally giving up team possession by way of a scrimmage kick or free kick. It could also be to simplify the rules to not allow advancement if A, B or C exist but allow it if D, E or F exist. What would be your cut off for advance a free kick you define as an onside kick? 10-20 yards beyond the free kick line? What if it's a pooch kick they recover at the 20? Should the kicking team be able to advance that kick? Would you argue that a kicking team should be able to advance any free kick they recover? Why not scrimmage kicks? Ultimately the best answer is because it's always been the rule. But that's not the answer you want.

It kind of exists already anyway since advantage/disadvantage comes into play. But it's still a lower threshold than the NCAA or NFL rule. Action that would not be a foul at those levels would be a foul in HS. Even at those levels it's applied very rarely so I don't feel it formally needs to be added to the HS rule. As for automatic first down and spot foul less than 15 yards, I'm for both of those 100%!

I agree. As Bobref has posted several times, this is a zero-sum game. Anyone who doesn't get assigned will feel the the process is unfair and can show it by leaving. We don't gain anything by using this as a collective justification for changing the process. The same number of officials/crews will be upset. It will just be a different group. I have friends in college and NFL officiating and they complain about their rating and post-season assigning process as well. Yes, the process needs to be updated, but retention of officials is not a primary reason. The other comment about having to "start over", they technically do. A crew who worked a state final is only eligible for a sectional final the following year just like every other crew. They often return because they are still getting the votes required to advance. Crews that only get 1 or 2 games need to realize the crew working regional and beyond aren't the ones they are "competing" against. They are competing against the crews getting the 2nd round and sectional final games. At that level performance has more of an impact than the number of votes. But there are still a limited number of games and good crews will be excluded no matter what.

Congrats on a great career and good luck with your retirement! I had the pleasure of working with you once. 40 years of of high school teaching and coaching is a great accomplishment. Thank you for all you've done.

Do you officiate basketball by chance? I believe "legal guarding position" is term used in basketball. I was able to find that clip and I think that should have been a DPI. There is definitely a restriction and a version of a hook and turn. It does appear to start before the ball is thrown, but if it was still occurring with the ball in the air it will become DPI. In this case the foul ruled is not critical as both with be half the distance penalties and result in a first down as enforcement is beyond the line to gain. The H probably should have gotten there quick enough to see this. It's not easy to do, but if he's doing his job well he would get there in time. The U would pivot to help with catch/no catch but would not rule on anything DPI or DH related. If the B has good periphery they would get there quicker as well even though their initial focus is on the other side of the field. This play is an example of the benefit of a 7-man crew in the playoffs or at least state championship. There would be a side judge on the pylon and this receiver would be his key. He would have him from the snap and would have a great view of this. Hopefully we'll get there eventually. There are always a handful of plays in each game where having deep wings make it much easier to get a call correct. You are going to have holes in 5-man.

The timing of any restriction is important to a foul occurring. If it happens just as the ball arrives it's not necessarily a foul. Those are referred to as "bang-bang" plays and you usually don't have a foul. If the official got there just as the ball arrived and see a grab, he's going to have to guess if the contact occurred before the ball arrived. If an official guesses and makes a call, they are going to wrong a lot more than they are going to be right. These are the types of things officials have to process all the time every game. If the official is being graded, he may still get downgraded for missing the call even if he did everything right. He could also be downgraded for mechanics if the call was right, but he was out of position or should have been looking at this action much sooner. I haven't seen the play (the 1:25:30 mark is a halftime interview with the coach) but Bob's judgement comment is likely spot on based on the descriptions I've read. Was there a grab that constitutes a material restriction? Did it take a step away or prevent an opponent from moving toward the ball? If it's after the ball was thrown, what category of DPI do you put it in (there are 6)? If there was restriction was it before or after the ball had passed the receiver? If before you have a DPI. If after you don't have DPI but could have a personal foul depending on how late or unnecessary. Those are all judgement decisions the official has to make based on what his or her eyes tell their brain. They will often replay it again in their mind before making a decision. That is what is meant by a "judgement" call. It's not black and white like other things.

I believe they were using schedules provided by Arbiter and Eventlink so it's very possible you showed up that way for the scrimmage teams. All of our votes were from schools we have worked since 2018 so we must not have had any write in votes. A couple of them were scrimmage teams but we also had them in regular season games in the past 3 years. If the scrimmage teams were included in the vote, we got votes from 45% of the schools eligible to vote for us. I'm not sure if the schools were told which game we worked. They aren't going to remember the name of every crew who worked each game. It would be very interesting to see the rates of votes crews received. I'm also wondering if the spread of write in votes was different than non-write in votes. I'm assuming most write-ins were positive. Could be a coach or AD who moved to that school were familiar with you. Or they saw you work. Or they are friends with a coach who suggested you were solid crew that earned a positive vote.

It's not the 1 votes that hurt you. It's the volume of 5 votes and distribution of 2-4 votes. To advance to a sectional final you generally need as many 5 votes as the others combined. At 128 you were very close to getting a first round game. The rating is for the crew and only the crew chief has access to it. The highest and lowest score are thrown out (more based on the volume of votes, but I'm not sure when that starts to increase) so your 1 was thrown out. There are only 140ish crews applying so you are obviously going to see a lot of the same names. From what I can tell there were 10 or 12 crews that worked the first round that didn't work last year so nearly 10% were different from last year. Many of those were likely crews last year with just a crew chief change. In the regional and beyond half the guidelines indicate half the crews are "returning" crews meaning they have worked a state final. Many think that favors the returning crews, but it actually helps the "new" crews. The last couple new crews who get a regional final probably rank lower than the returning crews who don't get a game. As has been stated many times here the crews who advance benefit from positive votes. Previously they also benefitted from a volume of votes. They likely aren't getting the 80-100 votes they did previously, but they are probably getting close to 45-50 votes which helps. The more votes you get the more likely you are getting 5s because more coaches/ADs know who you are. Having the crew chief work deep into the basketball or possibly baseball tournament is a huge advantage. No matter what they do won't change much as long as the coach vote is the primary factor.

In the past a flaw of the coaches voting for all crews is some crews get 80-100 votes and some only get 20-30. The excess votes are usually the result of a crew (especially the crew chief) advancing in other sports and becoming well known there. All those extra votes are most likely positive (aka 5) votes. We were told this year the ballot did only list the crews who were on the school's schedule using data acquired from the assigning siites (mostly Arbiter and Eventlink). I'm not sure if that was true, but if it is, the crews getting all the extra friendly votes are likely less impactful. I have talked with coaches who do not give a crew a vote rather than giving the crew a bad vote. I don't know how common that is, but I do know it happens. I heard about a coach who only gives votes to crews who earned a 5 in his eyes. He learned last year if you only give 5s, the IHSAA will discard all your votes because they feel you were giving positive votes to all your crews. Even with the limited vote there are issues with who can or can't vote for you. Let's say you had Fountain Central last year but they changed head coaches this year. Fountain Central can vote for you even though the current coach has never seen you. And that coach goes to West Lafayette. He has seen you work, but you haven't had West Lafayette in the last 3 years so this coach that knows you can't vote for you. If used the coach vote should probably be Tuesday-Thursday the week of the game.

They only had 3 and they were all 2001-2004 against Carmel. Another interesting fact. The teams with the most non-MIC losses in the last 25 years were Carmel and Center Grove with 12 (Pike also but that's not surprising). Warren Central has only lost 3 times to a non-MIC school in the playoffs and 2 of them were 24 (Arlington) and 25 (Richmond) years ago.

Did some quick analysis and found the following data points (considering Pike and LC as MIC the entire time): In the last 25 years, a MIC team has won state 20 times (could be 21 this year if CG or BD wins); 3 of the 4 were were 1997-200) In that same time 66% of the games the MIC lost were to other MIC teams Of 59 instances where a MIC team lost to a non-MIC team, the following teams won: Avon 8 (Pike 4 times), Bloomington South 7 (Center Grove 5 times 1997-2006), Fishers 5, and Cathedral 4 (LN and LC both in 2015 and 2016) Surprising teams that knocked out MIC teams were Lafayette Jeff (2002), Noblesville (2000), Northrop (1999), and Homestead (1998)over Carmel; Columbus East (2010), Columbus North (2008), and Terre Haute North (2005) over Center Grove; and Richmond over Warren Central (1997) In the last 9 years since Pike and LC joined the MIC, a MIC team has won every year, 75% of the MIC losses were to other MIC teams In that period MIC teams lost to non-MIC teams only 14 times; 4 were Cathedral and 8 were HCC teams (Avon, Fishers, Brownsburg, Zionsville); Penn had the other 2 The MIC domination of the playoffs has existed for 20+ years but has definitely been greater the past 9 seasons.

The ones I talk understand it. Many of them take it very seriously but also express frustration in seeing crews they like not being able to advance. I believe starting this year they only saw the crews that worked games at their school in the last 3 years (including this year). There are still flaws with that I'm sure you'll address in your next post, but it at least removed the mass of "friendly" votes some crews would get because they know a lot of ADs, especially because they have had success on the basketball side. Most of the crews who previously advanced deep would get 80+ votes while most crews only got 20-30 votes. Those extra 50+ vote are usually all 5s which greatly increases your average. It's a completely unscientific analysis and mostly anecdotal.

Most coaches I've talked with do not like the voting process. I'm not sure they are bought in entirely to having the voice they do.

This is a common complaint and a little myopic. Of the 9 crews working their first sectional final, only 1 is from Central Indiana and they actually worked a sectional final last year with 3 from southern Indiana and 5 from northern Indiana. It may appear that central Indiana crew advance more than others but one third of the licensed officials are from central Indiana. About one third of the assigned crews are from Indy metro so fairly standard representation. This year I count 17 Indy metro crew but I had to include Pendleton, Shelbyville, and Greenfield in that count. You could argue Indy metro is under represented based on percentage of officials. The Region has 5 with 3 from Valpo alone. I also count 4 from the Evansville area and 5 from Fort Wayne. The rest are scattered from around the state. There are no perfect systems. No matter what is done the crews who don't advance will feel slighted. Having the coach vote being the primary basis for the rating though is probably the worst method. I think the reason the IHSAA does it is because it's easy and don't require significant effort. The observer program has been a nice addition, but the fact it has little or no impact on your ability to advance is frustrating. Our crew hasn't advanced as far as we would like and we've been told by several observers we should advance as far as possible, but I have learned to control the things we can control. There is no reason for the IHSAA to change their method because they are generally getting good crews working in the later rounds. This seems to have improved over the past several years. I understand those who say we will lose officials over the rating system, but as another official told me if the system is changed the same number of officials will feel slighted. It may just be a different group. There are only so many spots. I like to hear they are holding back returning state final crews to give more crews an opportunity to work a sectional final. This isn't necessarily to give them extra points in the rating system but to make more crews eligible to advance next year. There are 9 new crews eligible for the regional round next year. As many as 6 of them wouldn't have been eligible if they used the 2020 state final crews. There have also been crews assigned this year who didn't work the previous week. I'm wondering if that is also intentional to give more crews changes to work. I have heard the same rumor Yucca mentioned. Curious to see if it happens. There is no favoritism or politicking taking place. There is a flawed rating system and the IHSAA follows those numbers to place crews in games. You can only manipulate it by adding members to your crew that can give you more tournament experience votes or making the referee be someone who advances deep in the basketball tournament. Otherwise you are at the mercy of how the vote turns out each year.

Hard to say without being there. Official probably had but gaffed on the flag and whistle at the time. He maybe went to R to explain what he had and that he failed to throw his flag. If they decide during the discussion that he should have killed it and it was definitely a foul they probably could drop a flag but it's more of a formality at that point. If this is what happened a possible discussion included the question "are you absolutely certain you had him in the neutral zone before the snap because this is not going to look good if we do this?" But it's better to look bad and be right. This is just one hypothetical.

It doesn't matter how many ball boys you have. It's more about how many bags to do you have to keep the balls dry. A smart team will have multiple balls checked before the game and keep many of them someplace where they'll stay dry. I would take some to the locker room and bring them back at halftime. Or have a case that will stay dry and put it under a tent many teams seems to have on the sideline.

The video wouldn't play for me, but if the slot guy moved up before the snap and got set then the formation is legal. He's covered which is legal. He just can't go downfield if there is a legal forward pass that crosses the neutral zone. Agree with Yucca that the R has no responsibility for counting the number of backs on any play. Almost always at least 1 or 2 of the backs are receivers outside the tackles. This is 100% on the wings. We don't have a signal for confirming both wings have 4 in the backfield. We have a signal if one of them has 5 in the backfield (tap flag). If they both have 4 there is no reason to do anything. In this case they would signal each other they both have 4 as neither had a flag per what's been reported. This post is a good example of why still photos often can't be used to determine if a foul has been committed. There was additional movement after this photo and before the snap which potentially changes the legality of the formation. You can share thoughts with a lot of caveats.

At the point of this photo I would consider this to be an illegal formation if the ball is snapped. We have no idea what the formation was at the snap though. One challenge here is the near wing may not see both of the backs near the interior linemen. The wing on the top has no idea if the slot is being ruled on or off. I've seen similar formations and the slot receiver is either supposed to be on the LOS intentionally being covered up or the end on the other side of the formation.

Some years the observers are asked to vote and some years they aren't. Some years when they vote their vote is factored in. We've had observer votes appears when we weren't observed by that observer. I love and respect the observer program, but it has little or impact on your rating and little or no impact on your advancement. We've been observed twice in a tournament game and given a 5 but didn't work the following week. Why would they observe us if they knew in advance we wouldn't have another game. There is a ton of potential for the observer program to have a greater input on crew ratings. The risk there though is many of the observers know and have worked with many of the crews they are observing. There is a potential for favoritism in that process if the rating has more value.

We generally work at the same pace regardless of how fast the team wants to go. The ball is placed and ready for play with 28-32 seconds on the play clock. Very rarely is a team ready to go when I step away. Some are faster than others after that, but very rarely is the ball snapped above 25 seconds. When most coaches are asking that question they are more worried about having a very slow crew.

In some cases yes, but not as much as some people think. It will probably have a bigger impact now that they've limited votes to crews you've seen in the last 3 years. That will likely compress the difference the coach vote portion will have between crews. I do think some weight needs to be given to those crews who have worked late in the tournament previously. That has to mean something.

That's the only time we've worked at Delta. I believe I was told later the visitors rarely go back to their locker room at halftime because of the distance. I'm not sure if they use the room you mentioned or just stayed on the field somewhere. Definitely not convenient. I checked our Hudl video and there were only 10 fouls called the entire game. Many were procedural (2 false starts, 1 illegal sub, 1 kick out of bounds, 1 illegal shift).