September 13, 2017
Summit Reimbursements
- Officials’ reimbursements from our summer’s Summit are starting to be received.
- Thanks for your patience.
- Thanks to Mark Sykes and Faith Morrison.
Vbobservers.org
- R1 and R2s, continue to keep up with your match reports.
- Line Judges have not had access to our website, since they do not submit reports, but there is information pertinent to our line judges.
- Thanks to Line Judge Amanda Rossman’s suggestion, all Line Judges can access information on our website without a login, as we now have all documents, (including each weekly Communique’, weekly emails with videos, CRS documents and other pertinent information).
- Under Observers/Officials Website – there is now a link to “General Information.”
Protests
- We can go an entire officiating career and not experience a protest!
- On our second weekend of pre-season play, Nikki Kathol(1st year and first assignment in Pac-12);
Kaili Kimura(second season in the Pac-12) and veteran, Ron Pelham had two protests in one tournament. One had to do with a missing point, the other was an error on the scoresheetregarding a player who was legitimately on the court. Both incidences were settled by accepting the protests and going to the stats.
- Kudos for paying attention to the clinic’s Points of Emphasis Module on “Protests” this summer. And, Anne Pufahl responded to the Protest reports that both were textbook.
- Referees - make sure to note a protest on the score sheet and on your match report AND notify me and Anne Pufahl
with succinct information.
(Noteany individual red card and disqualification on your match report and call me after the match.)
CRS
- GREAT NEWS!! Given that the CRS data has been frustrating to deliver (for you) and gather (for me), I asked Anne Pufahl, Steve Thorpe and Katy Meyer if we could please add “Original Decision” to the NCAA/PAVO Data Collection Form that your libero tracker has and hands to the R2 at the end of the match. It was approved!! Hopefully soon, you can just scan your collection form to me.
- As soon as I receive the final template with the edits, I will send them to you and the event managers. For now, continue to use the collection form that each libero tracker has been provided by the schools.
And, write the original decision for each challenge, so you can remember when submitting to me.
- Again, it does not help anyone to note the challenge and result of challenge:
“Ball contacting player” – reversed. (We don’t know if the original call was a touch or no touch.) OR
“Net Fault” – confirmed. (We don’t know if the original call was a net or no net.)
Payment Discrepancies
- Continue to check your finances a week prior to your assigned matches.
- Email me as soon as you discover any potential errors and I will pass it on to Chris Grant.
Line Judge Tracking Form
As you will recall at the Summit, Chris Clemens and Mark Sykes proposed a study to help line judges. Below is their report.
During the pre-season of the 2017 Pac-12 season, Mark Sykes and I developed and evaluated a Line Judge Tracking Form (LJTF). Over the course of three matches, we attempted to chart the line calls of line judges when the ball hit within a foot of a sideline or end line. This was an attempt to develop a pattern of where line judges might be missing line calls.
We found this alpha-test of the LJTF to be an exercise that we were not able to sustain during a match by an single observer. There are simply too many other things going on during a match that need to be addressed and assessed by the observer to give the LJTF the attention is may deserve.
We would suggest having another observer attempt a trial of the LJTF to see if our experience is a shared one or not. At the current time, we do not feel that the LJTF is a useful tool for determining a pattern of line judge calls.
Perhaps in the future, a "heat chart" can be developed and match-tested but only using a dedicated tracker, other than the assigned observer. There are currently some iPad apps that allow for developing a heat chart for line calls.
Chris Clemens
Mark Sykes
Hitting Tendencies
Jim Miret showed us Pac-12 Heat Charts for serves and attacks at the Summit and proposed that we investigate whether we could help line judges with “hitting tendencies” by using team statistics and/or video. This will be discussed at the January meeting by the coaches.