01-14-2020, 12:15 PM
Wow, officiating is a sensitive topic--MT's and my remarks certainly spawned a lot of exchange.
So I'm not misunderstood, my comments really were not directed at the quality of officiating--which might have been good or bad. They were noticing the differences in officiating between the two games.
It seems that this year, Tara is using the length and depth of our team--particularly Lacie and Lexie--and the energy of Anna Wilson--to play a more aggressive style of man defense than we have seen in some time. We are playing closer and are attempting to make ordinary passes and dribbles more difficult. This is a style of defense more reminiscent of ASU in past years than of Stanford.
When playing a close man, the style of officiating really matters. Refs who allow incidental contact that doesn't seem to interrupt the flow of the game are the perfect crew for the close man defense. Refs who call that contact, on the other hand, will force you to sag off a bit. I think we had one kind of crew for the first game and a different kind of crew for the second game. This allowed our defense to be more aggressive in the first game and less so in the second game.
As for why Cal got so many fewer fouls called on it in the second game--it could reflect a referee bias as some have suggested. If so, it doesn't change my point. OUR defense got the benefit of calls in the first game that it did not get the benefit of in the second. That's all I was trying to say.
The disparity of fouls in the second game is indeed irksome.
So I'm not misunderstood, my comments really were not directed at the quality of officiating--which might have been good or bad. They were noticing the differences in officiating between the two games.
It seems that this year, Tara is using the length and depth of our team--particularly Lacie and Lexie--and the energy of Anna Wilson--to play a more aggressive style of man defense than we have seen in some time. We are playing closer and are attempting to make ordinary passes and dribbles more difficult. This is a style of defense more reminiscent of ASU in past years than of Stanford.
When playing a close man, the style of officiating really matters. Refs who allow incidental contact that doesn't seem to interrupt the flow of the game are the perfect crew for the close man defense. Refs who call that contact, on the other hand, will force you to sag off a bit. I think we had one kind of crew for the first game and a different kind of crew for the second game. This allowed our defense to be more aggressive in the first game and less so in the second game.
As for why Cal got so many fewer fouls called on it in the second game--it could reflect a referee bias as some have suggested. If so, it doesn't change my point. OUR defense got the benefit of calls in the first game that it did not get the benefit of in the second. That's all I was trying to say.
The disparity of fouls in the second game is indeed irksome.