San Jose Officiating

[Clever Name]

Wow. Can it get any worse? If you breathe on someone you get a penalty. The WCRHL better not be like this the entire season.

[gameking28]

Seriously. The officiating is complete crap - this isn't hockey. I'm all for calling a tight game, but they are literally making up penalties to give out. If they can't come up with anything the old standby of "Unsportsmanlike Conduct" comes out. It's ok to man-up in hockey, even in a non-check league. ANY contact or near-contact is met with a hand in the air.

I hope someone from the WCRHL is paying attention to these forums because this is some of the worst "hockey" I've ever been forced to play.

[GSJaguars11]

i was playin in marple this weekend and it was the same thing, every time the puck was stolen everyone looked at the ref checking if it was a penalty

[rhhof]

Coast to coast consistancy it seems

Everyone will have to learn that skating hard and playing the puck is the name of the game at every level now....

[burrows00]

or how tying up on the face-off is now all of a sudden an interference penalty. no consistency at all between different officials and definitely took most of the fun away from the game. seemed like every team that competed can all agree.

[GoRangrHky]

My concern has always been who are we paying the officials to officiate for? In the NHL, they decided that they needed to call more penalties so that the fans would like the game more (not the case, but that's irrelevant). In CRH, they decided that they needed to call more penalties for.....

I have yet to find a person who is like "Wow, more penalties! This is awesome! NOW the games are high scoring!!" as if we had a plethora of 2-1 games all of the past few seasons that were keeping our television ratings and attendance figures too low. But now that we have more penalties every game, our franchise values will go up, the salary cap will increase, we'll be picked up by NBC, and our team owners will be billionaires!!! Watch out for the implementation of the trapezoid next season, and 6" wide goalie pads for the '10-'11 season. These 10-7 games are still too low scoring for the 18,000 we get a game.

I remember when I first started playing CRH that we were proud of the fact that this was a league of the players, for the players. It seems to be moving away from that. I'm not trying to start a revolt or anything, but we are the teams that comprise this league, and yes, the ones that pay the bills. Should we not be able to decide how we want our own games officiated??

[PGHhockey]

Should we not be able to decide how we want our own games officiated??

Excellent point to be raised...granted, I've never been to San Jose. Never officiated anywhere besides the East Coast...but here's my $0.02 anyway.

You'll never, ever, ever find any consistency among players on "how they want games to be officiated." Granted, it's no fun for anybody when a ref gets whistle-happy. But, it's even less fun when someone gets taken off on a stretcher, or someone gets involved in a lawsuit. We will forever fight the battle of finding a medium.

One guy on your team probably loves a tightly-called game because he's a 100% skill player with more speed than a Ferrari and better hands than one of the girls at your local Asian massage parlor.

Another guy on his team might be a 230-lb animal that uses his size and strength to win battles on the boards. I bet he doesn't like getting called for his rub-outs when he only knocks a guy over because he's outweighed by 60 lbs and the big boy has a 400-lb bench press.

Some guys have no regard for their bodies and think they're heading for the NHL (well, maybe a few of you actually are, kudos to you).

Other guys have a wife, kids, mortgage, 2 cars, and parents in a retirement home. You think that guy wants the refs to "let them play?"

I've come to the conclusion that this battle will never be "won" by either side. A certain percentage of players will always think we suck no matter what we do, and that's just part of the job that pays us so well.

Refs - just call the game the way it's supposed to be called. Safe, fair, and fun. That's all the players ask for.

[GoRangrHky]

I would say that it's simply the officials using their own judgment, except we all know that there is a "standard of enforcement" that is followed, especially when a ref says "that's how we have to call it this year".

As someone who played a LOT of defense in college (116 games on defense) and did not take a lot of penalties (112 minutes total) and has definitely been on the rink for many, many games (184 total) I know what is acceptable at this level and what is not. And it never seemed to be a problem before, so I don't know why last year the decision to change was made (besides the fact that USA Hockey told us to, which if that's the case, hey, a bunch of your friends are jumping off a bridge...) and an even stricter level was placed on the games this year.

You're right, players are going to think the refs suck no matter what. So if that's going to be the case, why not just call it the way it should be called instead of what some video has decided for you...

[topshelf]

I also just returned from San Jose, and agree with the earlier posts that the officiating was horrible. Every team was told that you can no longer lock up on the draw, that it would be called interference. And they were not just telling teams this they followed through and called this all tournament long. Players were also told and called for interference if they bodied up on one on ones or anywhere else on the rink. Since when in the game of hockey has someone said that being able to body up needs to be taken out of the game? The hooks and interference were called so often that you would have thought that the refs were being paid by piece work (paid by the call). If this is the direction that the league is going, they are really going to hurt the game. There was no flow to any of the games whatsoever. I can see making the calls for blatant hooks that take away clear scoring chances and incidents with clear intent to injure, which I did not see happen very often if at all. But I did see more calls than I can even begin to understand for just hard work and for playing fundamental hockey, which absolutely does not and should not constitute a penalty being called. By the way the team I'm with went 4-0, so I'm not crying foul.

Remember the officials are not supposed to decide games, but this weekend there were definitely games decided by the officiating.

[topshelf]

This is the penalty minutes for just the d1 teams for four games each.

San Diego State - 46 pims
UNLV - 46 pims
Northridge - 30 pims
Long Beach - 30 pims
UC Irvine - 36 pims
Cal Poly Slo - 52 pims
UC Santa Barbara - 44 pims

There is no way that this many calls is going to help the sport whatsoever.

What a complete joke!

[PGHhockey]

Maybe I'm misreading the post...but I have to play devil's advocate here:

If you were told about tying up on faceoffs, and bodying up on 1-on-1's, and hooking...why didn't you play within the rules that were given clearly in advance?

Or did the officials call the game differently than they said they would...?

[Clever Name]

This is the penalty minutes for just the d1 teams for four games each.

San Diego State - 46 pims
UNLV - 46 pims
Northridge - 30 pims
Long Beach - 30 pims
UC Irvine - 36 pims
Cal Poly Slo - 52 pims
UC Santa Barbara - 44 pims

There is no way that this many calls is going to help the sport whatsoever.

What a complete joke!

damn that's a lot. I was looking around other divisions and take a look at D2...Cal Poly Pomona had 88 Pims in 4 games.

[GoRangrHky]

Sorry, but them telling you how they are going to call it doesn't mean that it's right. This is turning into a field hockey game out there. Soon you're not going to be allowed to take a shot that goes more than a foot off the ground, and eventually you're not going to be able to use the back of your blade any more....

I remember 4-5 years ago when there was practically open ice hitting allowed at nationals. People thought it was a little rough, and some teams were surprised, but I would imagine that all of those teams would prefer that over what's being called now.

[rhhof]

Thats funny, this standard has been involved in NARCh, USA Hockey Inline and other USA Sponsored events over the past couple of years and I really havent heard any complaints when I attend these events

This is a black and white issue - skate hard, use your stick to go after the puck, do not play the body at all and there will not be any problems

Maybe everyone needs to pick up a copy of the USAIL rule book...better yet, no one reads a book anymore - just go to www.usahockey.com and look at the standard of play video and figure it out quick.....The rule enforcement has been in place for a while now - Don't you guys watch the NHL, everybody is doing it - Thats the game now a days...skill and speed, you dont have any, get some quick...sorry

[Clever Name]

Maybe I'm misreading the post...but I have to play devil's advocate here:

If you were told about tying up on faceoffs, and bodying up on 1-on-1's, and hooking...why didn't you play within the rules that were given clearly in advance?

Or did the officials call the game differently than they said they would...?

can't be true for everyone because i was not told beforehand how the games would be called.