2013 Exhibition: Southern Connecticut - Friday Nov 1

[Bos8]

Didn't something happen with Sean Miller last year?

[rambone 78]

Their best is sometimes pretty lousy. I know it's a tough game to officiate, but there simply aren't enough qualified refs to go around. There seems to be more schools playing D1 basketball every year. That, with all the rule changes thrown in, makes it even harder.

[bigappleram]

Last week I had a Div 1 CBB referee, who does A10 games, flat out admit that college basketball referees moreso than any other sport employ the science of "make up calls". Whether right or wrong his defense was that their are so many calls in the course of a CBB game and they are bound to make mistakes and get some wrong (assuming no instant replay calls). To that end they use make up calls to balance out the admitted mistakes.

[SGreenwell]

Their best is sometimes pretty lousy. I know it's a tough game to officiate, but there simply aren't enough qualified refs to go around. There seems to be more schools playing D1 basketball every year. That, with all the rule changes thrown in, makes it even harder.

If you want better refs, then you'd need to put out substantially more money. I can't remember if I saw it on Grantland or ESPN or somewhere else, but you're mostly having guys around the 6-foot mark, at best, trying to officiate a game involving a bunch of quick giants. Former players aren't especially interested in becoming refs themselves. You could also probably increase the quality by increasing the number of refs on the court, which would also mitigate some of the corruption worries.

[section(105)]

More refs to work the game......would lead to more disruptions and more whistles.......three is enough.......the age ole problem of the human factor in games and their degree influence on the outcome of the games.......

[neil]

Blue Man - loved your comments about 205, especially the woman reading on her Ipad -that's my wife. She grudgingly comes to a game every decade. It wasn't Danielle Steel, but she did go on to play solitaire. Hopefully, the guy sitting next to her (me) did cheer, stand up before X nailed a three and after each time out. Your comments were great! Looking forward to introducing myself on Friday. BTW, the wife will not be in attendance.

[ATPTourFan]

So funny, Neil. You were in your typical form, standing and pointing to the Southern CT coach to anticipate a timeout after each Rhody run! Plenty of room to spread out in your row last Friday. Row H was packed!

[neil]

Matt and his two kids will fill part of the row up on Friday.

[ATPTourFan]

Great news! Is it Friday yet?

[Blue Man]

Blue Man - loved your comments about 205, especially the woman reading on her Ipad -that's my wife. She grudgingly comes to a game every decade. It wasn't Danielle Steel, but she did go on to play solitaire. Hopefully, the guy sitting next to her (me) did cheer, stand up before X nailed a three and after each time out. Your comments were great! Looking forward to introducing myself on Friday. BTW, the wife will not be in attendance.

Haha you were into it for sure. The title of the book was "The Husband's Secret" I could only assume, based on my limited knowledge of women's novels. Looking forward to meeting another from the board!

[ace]

[Rhodygirl2]

Neil - it's a good thing I didn't see the name of the book at the time, I read it last month and would have wanted to ruin the secret for her so she would pay attention to rhody.

Blue man - I said to my sister "I hope he doesn't see her reading as he'll say something and might not know that's Neil's wife!" I was anticipating you getting thrown out on your first game in 205.

Neil's enthusiasm more than makes up for reading or solitaire.

[Blue Man]

Neil - it's a good thing I didn't see the name of the book at the time, I read it last month and would have wanted to ruin the secret for her so she would pay attention to rhody.

Blue man - I said to my sister "I hope he doesn't see her reading as he'll say something and might not know that's Neil's wife!" I was anticipating you getting thrown out on your first game in 205.

Neil's enthusiasm more than makes up for reading or solitaire.

It seems that I'm going to be pushing the envelope on what is deemed "acceptable" behavior for the longer tenured patrons of 205.

I figure if I don't swear, people are just gonna have to put up with it. I would love to see the projo article "Fan Kicked out of basketball game for acting like a fan" though.

Thank God I upped my donation!

More importantly Rhody Girl...WHAT'S THE HUSBAND'S SECRET!?

and was it book porn?! The masses must know!!

[Rhodygirl2]

Ha- there were a few steamy scenes but not bookporn. And spoiler alert, he killed someone as a teenager (or contributed to her death, not so black and white) ...

Don't worry Blue Ram, my brother and his best friend now sitting with me will be right with you in shaking things up in 205. I'm sure I'll want to disown them at least once a game.

So excited for tomorrow!

[ATPTourFan]

See ya there, RhodyGirl2!

[CT Rhody]

Anybody see an attendance number from this game?

[ATPTourFan]

3200

Wasn't originally in the box score, but it is now. Also, Koch mentioned it in his piece today.

[ELeslie's 1st assist]

Spare me the "URI-has-gotten-screwed-by-the-refs-every-game-for-the-last-decade" beef. Gimme a break. Find me an opposing fan base that says "Yeah, we get every call. Especially when we play Rhode Island, the refs side with us."

In fact, I believe Kentucky has a website where it's strictly devoted to how each ref went against UK in their calls. So Kentucky fans think they're the ones getting screwed. I'm so tired of hearing people whine about the refs.

Do the Patriots get all the calls? Well apparently, the Jets got the call vs. the Pats a few weeks ago. Did the Red Sox never get a call until 2004? Now they get all the calls? So they never won a World Series between 1918-2004 b/c the umpires conspired against them? Right. I got it.

It's never the players' faults for losing.

Refs are to blame for URI's failures. Makes perfect sense.

[rambone 78]

We tend to focus on the very few BIG games in the past, where it seemed like a crucial LATE call went against us.

That's as in the 1978 Duke game, the 1988 Duke game, and the 1998 Stanford game. I guess you can throw in the NIT game against NC, too.

On the whole, yes the calls even out, but using those examples, it seems like we got screwed in those games at the end. And we did, in those instances. URI doesn't get the opportunity to be IN those types of games very often, so bad calls against us at crucial times tend to get magnified.

URI has never won a postseason tourney in men's BB. It's always been a loss in the final game, or before.

One thing from that you can be sure of: when it comes down to us versus a big name team, who's going to get the key call go their way? You know the answer to that one. We're not alone either.

[rambone 78]

I have a saying about this stuff:

The winners get all the calls, the losers get kicked in the balls.

Or so it seems.