For those of you who are currently in the middle of your midget hockey experience or perhaps even better those of you who are just moving up into midgets this is for you. I am posting this to bring attention to the lack of governance for midget hockey officiating.
2017-02-26 CAHA Playdowns - Bears 18aa @ Wave 18aa-1 - NorCal Homering or Incompetency?
https://youtu.be/84NawBIhd5o Let me first say that we need refs for our kids to play this game they love so much and they need to be treated with respect. But we also need them to be trained properly and be as consistent as possible from game to game so that kids learn properly. They are as much a teacher as the kid’s coaches. I get that refs are going to make a mistake here and there and that is fine.
But to be so off the mark all over the ice during a playoff game is completely unacceptable. I place a lot of the blame on CAHA as they do nothing to improve this issue.
CAHA is more concerned about the parents in the crowd than the game itself. They are more focused on unruly parents than what is causing the problem. Perhaps if they address the root of the issue the other will go away, or at least decrease substantially? There were 3-4 CAHA officials walking around the crowd providing no governance on what was happing on the ice at all. Not sure why so they are there. I would rather see a Sr Referee overseeing the game than some empty suit walking around.
My suggestion to you is to push your clubs and push CAHA to address this issue sooner than later. We all put a lot of time and money into our kids each season and to watch it go out the window due to referee incompetency and/or homering is not acceptable.
CAHA: You get what you pay for. So instead of being cheap, why don’t you pay a little more for the officials to provide a higher quality product for your customers? I believe USA hockey guidelines recommend using an L3 ref and linesmen for a Tier 2 game. I can’t believe the officials you used met that for the 18aa playdowns. But then again how would we know nothing is published on the game sheets or elsewhere for that matter. I guess we just should believe it is so?
CAHA: You need to come up with a way to incentivize the officials that you use to do a better more consistent job. There should be some checks and balances to ensure fairness.
A few suggestions:
· Move to a four-official system like high school uses (at a minimum for playoffs and states)
o Most officials cannot keep up with the pace these kids skate at so they are always behind the play and out of position
· Ensure that the officials used in a playoff games are split from the regions (NorCal -SoCal)
o This will help mitigate any homering
· Dis-allow all pre-game conversations between officials and coaches unless each team coach is present for the discussion.
o We have all seen too many times coaches buttering up the officials prior to game start
o Keep it strictly professional and ethical
· Ensure that a Sr Referee is overseeing the games to providing feedback to the on-ice officials
For CAHA to say that they do not want to change because it would cost more is also unacceptable. I cannot believe it would cost each player that much more over the course of a season to provide an additional ref or a higher quality official. What is another hundred or two dollars added on to a season? We already are spending 5-10k(with travel) and I think every family would be willing pay a little more if they were getting a higher quality product.
The other issue I see is the choice of venues for Playdowns and States. Here is another area that CAHA needs to address. We should not be holding a Tier level of playoffs in a facility that is having issues with their ice. Case in point: Vacaville Ice visitor net not staying in position during the game. As well as having officials that do not know how to mitigate it or at least unwilling to do so.
2017-02-26 CAHA Playdowns - Bears 18aa @ Wave 18aa-1 - Goal Net Issues All Game:
https://youtu.be/ZS7kFUjCl-o Not sure why the officials refused to water the net down in the first and third period’s while the Bears where in goal. But did water it down the one and only time in the second that it came off while the Wave was in goal.
Bottom line, we all want to see a fair and even chance given to both teams during the game. With the officiating, we got during this game that was not close to happening.
Good luck to all future midgets and clubs.