Question For the Refs

Here are a couple thoughts regarding high school vs. college officials.

 

First - If you are referring to the college games that you see on TV, you are talking about officials that are paid up to $1,000 or more per game. When compared to the $50 - $60 bucks a game that the high school officials are paid it would make sense that the college guys seem to call a better game. That makes it quite a bit easier to spend time and money attending camps to improve your craft when you are making 10 to 20 times the fee.

 

Secondly - The higher the level of play, the easier the game is to call. College games are played at a much higher skill level than high school games and that makes for an easier game to referee. Granted, the speed is much greater and things happen quicker, but you eliminate most of the awkwardness that you see in high school games. Keep in mind, only a very low percentage of high school players go on to play in college so the quality is much higher.

 

Thirdly - If you are talking about smaller college (Div III, Div II or NAIA), most of these officials are the same guys that call high school games and can make the travel work. So the major difference would be the quality of the play. You would also only have the best HS officials working these college games so that would also give you better officiated games.

 

All in all, the quality of officiating obviously improves as the level of play improves. NBA officials are the best, college officials do a better job than most HS guys and you don't expect to see too many 5th/6th grade games being officiated by the better HS varsity officials.