Why Ref’s should always throw flags

[BLCamp]

Watch the Curie Semifinals 2-2 (cur_SF2-2.wmv) on soap,
http://soap.circuitrunners.com/2006/movies/curie/

This was the second match between the Red Alliance (79, 469, and 222) and the Blue Alliance (503, 451, and 1139). The first match went to the Red Alliance with a score of 121 to 31. In this second match, the Blue Alliance won autonomous with an excellent defensive maneuver which sent the Red into offensive mode.

You can see that Blue is playing some really tough defense of which I am a big fan. Unfortunately, they are using all three of their robots to do so. For most of the 2nd period you can see all three robots on screen blocking, pushing, and turning the Red Alliance robots. This did not fall on blind eyes. At the top of the screen you can see the sideline Referee counting down the offside penalties. The Ref clearly motions two penalties before one of the blue bots retreats across the mid-field line.

The match was extremely close and the Soap video shows the scoreboard with the official score of 77 to 71 in favor of the Blue Alliance. What’s missing from the score is any mention of the 2 off-side penalties that were called on the field.

I know from experience that when you’re refereeing you cannot see everything, and you sometimes miss calling penalties because of this lamentable lack of omniscience. However, if you are Refereeing and you do see a penalty, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WRITE IT DOWN OR THROW A FLAG or do something to remind yourself at the end of the match that it was there.

This completely changed the outcome of the Curie field and who knows what would have happened if the 2nd seed alliance of teams 79, 469, and 222 and the 1st seed alliance of teams 70, 1114, and 48 faced off and either one of these powerhouse offensive alliances went to play on Einstein.