Today boys and girls we are going to talk about officials; no, not they type of officials you can read about in other sections of this fine weekly, rather athletic officials: basketball referees, soccer referees, umpires and the such. This comes to mind because of something that happened at my son Joe’s first grade indoor soccer game at Tony Glavin’s complex. It seems the opposing coach was less than happy because one of Joe’s teammates, Andrew Clark, tumbled over the goalie in an attempt to get a ball. From my perspective it all seemed incidental and legal, especially considering some of the other “contact” being allowed. Hey, soccer is a rough, contact game; I think. The opposing coach went nuts! He screamed in an attempt to make his point – achieving only one thing: making a complete fool of himself. To make matters even worse, the young referee he was yelling at was clearly only an underclass high school student.
It was over ten years ago, while being orientated to the world of high school athletic administration by St. Charles native and current resident, Don Oelklaus, that I was taught the following lesson: “Officials never influence the outcome of a contest, no matter what the sport.” It is a lesson I have taken to heart and believe to be true. Even those who like to complain about game six of the 1985 World Series have no response to the question: What happened in game seven? Nope, from my perspective if you argue with an official you need to be removed from a game – certainly at the youth level. Have you any idea how hard it is to get officials? Then people want to go and yell at them; no sir. Shouldn’t happen, ever! For the most part they let anyone coach youth sports (have I mentioned I coach a kindergarten soccer team and a first grade baseball team), whereas officials at least go through some formal training.
On a related note, my final year of coaching high school football was at Trinity Catholic High School in Spanish Lake. The head coach was some young man whose name really does escape me. In the previous two seasons he led the team to identical records of 1-9. As the season went on he constantly complained of the quality of officials assigned to our games. Enter Oelklaus’ philosophy of officials. “The good officials are going to get the good games, the bad officials are going to be assigned to bad games.” If you were an official and were offered a game between Duchesne and Saint Charles West or Trinity Catholic versus Bunker Hill (yes, we were really hard up for a win) the good official would take the first game every time, every single time. Loober, that was his name, could not understand or accept that. He really thought his games deserved top-notch officials, even though the quality of play on the field was barely that of a good j.v. game. Incidentally, Trinity Catholic has continued to go 1-9 for four years running with Loober at the helm.
My point? Lay off the officials, at all levels of competition, but especially at high school games, and most importantly at youth contests. Here is a novel idea: keep your mouth shut until the contest is over, then walk over, shake the official’s hand, and tell them, “Good game, ref!” Such behavior will only improve the quality of the game from all aspects.
This probably should appear on the “letters to the editor” page, but since Greg Almus e-mailed his letter to me, I have the honor of sharing his thoughts. It seems Greg no longer needs his Journal, or at least that is his feeling. “I simply throw my Journal in the trash because the First Capitol News covers the local high school scene (that would be me). I wonder why the Journal decides not to print the stories I see in the FCN,” questioned Almus, “are they afraid of something or someone?” Almus is a little too poetic for me when he says, “The First Capitol News prints the stories most important to the First Capitol.” Rather “cheesy,” yet point well taken.
This week’s “athlete of the week” could be none other than Saint Charles High’s Abby Schultenrich. Rather than write an article about Abby’s performance against Jennings on Tuesday evening, her accomplishments are mentioned in the headline story. In the past fifteen years I have seen a number of gifted high school athletes with some rather impressive performances. Probably the most impressive was Darren Brooks, who recently broke Larry Byrd’s career steals mark in the Missouri Valley Conference. Abby’s performance Tuesday evening is on the top of the list. It was something to see.
And last but not least, Ray Bulte has the honor of being recognized as the 21st regular reader of this column. At last Saturday’s Father Daughter Breakfast at Academy of the Sacred Heart, he was the first, and not the only, might I add, to lay claim to the prestigious title. Congratulations to Ray, your life will never be the same.
