College Basketball Official Ed Hightower Talks Officiating and the State of College Basketball!

Q: Scoring is down in college basketball. Do you think it’s bad or good for the game? If you do think it’s bad, how would you fix it? A: First of all, I

Q: Scoring is down in college basketball. Do you think it’s bad or good for the game? If you do think it’s bad, how would you fix it?

A: First of all, I think college basketball is as good as ever. I’ve been around this game a long, long time. I’ve watched it evolve. I’ve watched it go through major changes. Certainly, when the NCAA made the change where young people could leave college early we all said that basketball was going to dissipate into something that we would not recognize. The attendance is as good as ever. The Final Fours are as good as ever. The bottom line, I don’t think we have to be so concerned about scoring as the kids being fundamentally sound. Kids going out and doing it the right way. Kids being ethical in their approach to the game. We represent the college game of basketball in the way that we should. That’s what we should be concerned about. But if I were gonna try and speed up the game, certainly you would think that the change whereby we would move the arc out, it would be basically done to make the game safer for the players. That is always a concern when we have those players stepping out to take a charge and there is no reason to do so. So it was put in there as a safety factor. But certainly it was done as well, in my belief, to try and increase the offense by stopping some of the charges that’s called. I think it’s gonna continue to do that. I think the game, if we move that arc out a little bit more, I really believe that it will increase the opportunity for scoring. That’s number one. I believe if we go to do away with the 10 second count in the backcourt and go more to the NBA clock where there is no count, that’s gonna speed up the scoring. But bottom line, it doesn’t matter. As long as the game is played and there is hard defense, which many of the teams if you’re gonna win a national championship you have to play defense. I don’t think we need to do anything to the game. I think we need to continue to focus on working with officials to be more consistent. I think we need to work on making sure that we all, coaches, players, officials, represent the game like it should be. Because again, millions and millions of young people, elderly people and other people are watching and they see this as a game of appreciation and we can’t not do things on the floor to distract from that. So as far as the game is concerned, I think the game is in great hands. But certainly if we were talking about speeding up the game, there are some things we could do in that fashion. Another thing we could do in that fashion, at the end of the game do away with some of the fouls that’s happening. In my opinion I think we ought to…and again, this is my opinion…when I know that I’ve got a team that does not shoot free throws very well and I start fouling with 3 minutes to go in the game just to put them at the free throw line, give them the option of taking the ball out of bounds. Those are the kinds of things that we can do to help the game along. Another thing…I’m kind of extending what you asked…the other thing that I would like to see us do is in the last 2 minutes give the officials more autonomy to go to the TV monitor and make sure that we get certain calls right. Like out of bounds calls, those are critical calls. I don’t care how good they say we are, we are not that good at times, when it comes to making that crucial call, when it’s off somebody and it’s just a blink and you miss it and it causes somebody a possession in the last 2 minutes or something. If it warrants it, let us take a look at it. Get the play right rather than being concerned with stretching the game out. So those are just some things that I would like to see us do, in addition to keeping the game safe and keeping the game entertainment and making sure that we all do a professional job of representing the wonderful game of college basketball.

Q: Where is officiating right now relative to where you’d like to see it?

A: I think officiating right now is going through a transitional change, it is. When you look at some of the veteran officials who have, and let’s just call a spade a spade and put me in that boat, you’re talking about the Jim Burrs of the world. We lost a great official, Steve Welmer, and I’ll just use him as an example. You’ve got a great guy up there in Michigan in Ted Hillary. I’m just gonna use those three or four things. When those guys had started to transition out of college basketball and the next tier of officials have started to move in, there is that transitional period that you go through. But I really believe that college basketball is in good hands. I really believe that supervisors across the country are working hard to try and make the game of basketball consistent across the country. Coaches are for the most part are doing their part. We officials have an obligation, we veteran officials, have an obligation to be mentors to the younger officials. To make sure that they have the same opportunity to be successful in this great game of basketball that we had when we transitioned to the next level and replaced some of the veteran officials who had had such great careers. I believe that we are in a transitional period right now. But that does not mean that the game has fallen back. That does not mean that the coaching is bad. That does not mean that officiating… I mean that we’re going to that transitional period, we all are. But the game of basketball is in a very healthy, at a very healthy state right now. With some of the great coaches, the veteran coaches, the young coaches who are coming in. Again, you’re seeing that happen where some of the veteran coaches are transitioning out and new coaches are coming in. It takes time, takes a little time, to make that transition. The same thing happens in officiating. And that should be expected.

Q: If the NCAA wanted you to come in and fix it or make it better, what would you do to implement what you want to do?

A: Again, I’m a teacher by trade. I have over 1,100 employees in my job by trade. I teach part time, and have taught, and will go back to teaching at the university level when I get out of my Superintendency. I’m always in that teaching mode. What I think should be done… When I broke in to college basketball… Some of the younger people always like to say, Well when you broke in, it’s a different era now. Well, when I broke in I broke in on a crew, I broke in with veteran officials. I broke in with the veteran coaches like Jud Heathcote, Bob Knight, Gene Keady. So I broke in with a veteran official. I was not just turned loose and said sink or swim. You can’t do that. I would be more in a mentoring role. I would bring young officials on and I would work them in the preseason. Coaches would see them. Give them an opportunity to be seen. It’s all about being accepted. It’s all about being respected. And the only way you’re gonna be accepted is for coaches to see you make tough calls, and they can trust you to make that tough call on the road. So I would keep mentoring the younger officials under the veteran officials. Then as we get into the Conference season I’m not gonna turn these young kids loose, and I mean kids. But I would have them work some Conference games. You can spot those officials. I would make sure that I’m continuing to work younger officials with veteran officials and not just hope that those individuals develop. We’re going more to technology now. We’re going more to where the technology is such that you have to get game films, you have to dissect those game films, you have to fill out reports, you go back… I’ve got a tape right now that I’ve gotta go through that the Big 10 sent me of every game that I worked during the Big 10 season. I’ve gotta go through that tape and sit down and review it and then make comments on it. It’s not a matter of whether I can disagree or agree with what I called. You need to take a look at this and you need to get better. So we’re going with that. But we need to make sure that these young officials that we’re bringing on are mentored for a period of time under the veteran officials and they’re not thrown into a major game with major significance where there’s so much riding and they have not been tested. That is the issue and concern that certainly I see across the country, because everybody is working every night and there is not the strong training, mentoring program across the country on a consistent basis that I really think is needed.

Q: A very well respected official said when he came up he was told by the older officials to shut up. You don’t argue with the coach. You’ll earn the right to call technicals. Is that true?

A: I agree with that. That was how I was brought up. That’s the way I was brought up. You learn, you listen, you take some criticism because that doesn’t mean you gotta go out there and get embarrassed. You don’t earn your stripes by going out there and being a tough guy. Anybody who thinks you can earn respect by being a tough guy, it doesn’t work. It does not work. That is the one thing that bothered me more than anything else. Anything else. If I’m working with a young guy and we’ve got a problem in the game, you come to me and we talk about it and we’re gonna go over there and we’re gonna try and fix this situation with the coaches and get them squared away and try and operate that game that night so that it does not hit the roof. That is the key. I have a motto…you work tonight so that you can work again the next game. You don’t get yourself in a situation where you wanna be the tough guy, you have to be the know-it-all. You haven’t earned the right as a young official. It’s no different than a coach. That assistant coach when he breaks in… And I coached when I first started out. I played college basketball and I coached high school, 9th grade basketball, until I went into officiating. So I get it. I do get it. That assistant coach will sit there, keep his mouth shut, earn his stripes, earn the respect of that coach. When the coach believes in that guy enough that he starts turning to him and say, What do you think, then you’ve earned your right to give your opinion. It’s the same way with officiating. You haven’t been there long enough. And that’s what I tell young officials. Don’t go out there trying to strut your stuff, being a tough guy, trying to say I’m here tonight, and if I‘ve got something to say you’re gonna listen to me, Coach. No, you have not earned that right. Now this is from the old school. I was brought up like that, I believe that. This is how I run my school district.

Q: The NCAA put the half moon under the basket. I like that. Do you?

A: Yeah, that’s what I was saying earlier about… The decision now has to be made. We had it in place last year. We now have to make the decision. If we’re gonna take it out a little bit farther, just to make it a lot clearer, that you’re not gonna be stepping in there defensively at the last moment. Ok? That will increase scoring and again, it adds to the safety objective that we have for the game. So I think we made great strides there. I would hope that in the next couple years the NCAA will see fit to move that area, move that arc, a little bit further out and I think you’re gonna see the game open up even more.