Article published Sep 20, 2006
Should officials be tossed into a national pool?
AL LESAR
Tribune Staff Writer
Could the officiating disaster at Oregon last Saturday hurry along a major overhaul in the way college football arbitrates its games?
"It will surely add some chips to the scale (in favor of a change)," said Dave Parry of Michigan City, the Big Ten Conference's supervisor of officials.
For about five years, the major players in the administration of college football have been tinkering with the idea of having a national pool of officials, rather than each conference having its own group.
Earlier this week, when the PAC-10 apologized for mistakes made by its crew of officials working the Oklahoma-Oregon game in Eugene that severely hurt the Sooners in their 34-33 loss, it added fuel to the smoldering discussion of a re-organization.
"The bottom line is, we'd have a neutral crew (with the change)," Parry said. "There'd be no labels."In high-profile BCS-ramification games, if something is even perceived to go wrong, there'd be no cries of 'home-cookin'.' Having a pool of officials with no connection to either team would eliminate that."
Two plays late in the game were the most obvious to cause the concern. Television replays showed an Oregon player touching an Oregon onside kick and an Oklahoma player before the ball traveled the necessary 10 yards, but Oregon was awarded the ball. Also, a pass interference penalty against the Sooners should have been waved off because an Oklahoma defensive lineman tipped the pass.
Both calls were reviewed but not reversed.
"I feel sorry for the people involved," said Parry, one of the nation's big-shooters when it comes to officiating. "No one does something like that on purpose. We went to the replay (three years ago in the Big Ten) to make sure we get extremely difficult plays right. Unfortunately, they didn't get it right.""Mistakes are part of the game," Ohio State coach Jim Tressel said. "(The review officials) get to see a play from several different angles. But if you don't have a camera at just the right angle, it makes it really difficult to make a decision. The onus is on the people upstairs to get it right."
But, do the coaches want to see a national pool of officials?
"There are certainly some valid points in favor of (the national pool)," Michigan coach Lloyd Carr said. "It seems to me to be a logistical problem, bringing officials in for a game from all over the country. Then, you have to make sure they're trained the same way by the same people."
"I don't think it would be too difficult to put together a national pool," Parry said. "There might be some extra travel expenses, but the way travel is now, it's hard to predict."
Parry's plan would start by involving just the BCS conferences -- Big Ten, PAC-10, Atlantic Coast, Big 12, Southeastern and Big East. That would mean about 300 officials would be in the pool. There would be some sort of geographic determination, dividing that group into general categories -- West, Midwest and East.All those officials would attend one clinic. Beyond that, they would be sent the same tapes, bulletins, speeches and rules interpretation information.
"I think we have to take a long, hard look to see if there's a better way to do business," Parry said.
"Anything is possible, but I can't see something (like a national pool of officials) happening because it's a costly proposition," Purdue coach Joe Tiller said. "I could see them going to a national pool of replay officials. That would be less expensive. But I've learned, never say never."
"We average one review per game," Parry said. "We're going to fly guys around the country for one play out of 160? It makes more sense to do that with the whole crew."
It might be time for a change. People in Oklahoma think so.
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Should officials be tossed into a national pool?
