The Pac-12 Conference Friday formally reprimanded University of Washington basketball coach Lorenzo Romar for the comments he made Wednesday night about the officiating following the Huskies’ 82-81 loss at Oregon State that, for all practical purposes, ended UW’s chances of receiving at at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
“The Pac-12 has specific rules that prohibit our coaches from making public comments about officiating,” Commissioner Larry Scott stated in a post on the conference’s website. “We have an obligation to our membership to enforce the Conference rules which they have approved. As a part of our officiating program, there is a protocol in place for our coaches to provide feedback directly to the coordinator of officials.”
With five seconds remaining Wednesday night, Washington’s Andrew Andrews was fouled at the far end of the court. Andrews sank the first, missed the second and the ball went out of play to OSU.
The in-bounds pass at 3.3 seconds was given to freshman guard Stephen Thompson Jr., but the game clock didn’t start until after he had begun dribbling. He sprinted down the floor under pressure from Dejounte Murray and heaved up a shot at 0:00.7, clearly traveling in the process, as replays showed.
But the referees missed the call and the delayed clock start, the ball went in and fans rushed the floor to celebrate re-taking a game in the final second the Beavers seemed to have given away.
Romar called the Pac-12 to complain, according to ESPN, but the conference has no formal protest policy. The conference in a statement found no problem with the clock and said that traveling is a non-reviewable judgment call.
Romar told the News Tribune, “The whole point is that you’re talking about a potential NCAA tournament berth. You’re talking about kids busting their tail, playing their tails off, giving it everything they have, like both teams did.
“But when something like that happens . . . it’s not even about discussing if the clock started late, or if there was a travel. It’s not even about that. That’s a foregone conclusion. I’m sure those involved saw that, OK, yeah, there was a travel. OK, yeah, the clock . . . that was just pretty cut and dry.
“The point is that it’s just difficult to see if it’s that blatant, that that could have something to do with potentially ending our NCAA tournament chances.”
The loss left the Huskies with a 16-12 record, including 8-8 in conference play. They play at Oregon Sunday, but even with a win the Huskies likely will have to win the conference tournament in order to make the 68-team NCAA field.
<span class="dsq-postid" data-dsqidentifier="2215686 https://sportspressnw.wpengine.com/?p=2215686">9 Comments
Only the Pac-12 is unaccountable, Mr. Romar! Everyone else has to answer for their words and deeds!
Nice transparency Pac-12. Your doing a bang-up job there at League office in keeping your laughing-stock Officiating Programs accountable. I enjoyed your one sentence press release letting the World know that your Refs and Clock operator get it all right at the end of the OSU – UW game (when it is clearly obvious that they did not). The second sentence was also a nice touch – that traveling is not reviewable. That’s not the point – no one was expecting a reversal of the call. But coming clean that the call was not made correctly would be a reasonable expectation for professionally run organization.
Lovely as well to repremind the Coach. How dare he question our perfection. Can’t he see that we got it right? Don’t question us again.
It’s nice to know that the Commissioner and the League office is protecting its member institutions by enforcing its rules about coaches not complaining about sub-par officiating. Too bad Conference Leadership feels no similar obligation to member institutions and its fan base to deliver transparent and accountable officiating programs that hold themselves to the highest standards.
And oh by the way, Pac-12 Office – while your working on getting your act together – please get a deal done with Direct TV like every other Conference in the Country has done.
How Pac-12 Member Institutions continue to accept the embarrassment that is this Conference’s leadership is beyond me. My guess is they won’t be putting up with current leadership much longer.
Contrast this to how the Mt West handled a similar situation. They said they couldn’t change the game but admitted the call was wrong.
The Pac 12 denied what everyone watching on national TV saw and they wonder why they have such a lousy reputation for officiating.
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Bye Bye – I’m taking bets on who the new coach is.
I bet James Naismith would be surprised to learn that traveling is a judgment call.
Perfect. Just perfect.
Blow two calls and reprimand the coach who brought them to your attention.
Best revenge — and way to salvage a disappointing season — would be to win the conference tournament. Might even save coach Romar’s job, too.
Let’s face it, UW is a step child of this conference, despite being one of its oldest members. I’ve hate this new conference admin since they stiffed the NW schools in order to bring in Colorado and Utah……setting up football schedules that allows for the 4 NW schools to have only ONE game/year against USC & UCLA (the media capital of our conference) while the other 6 schools (non UCLA & USC)…INCLUDING the newcomers get to play BOTH LA schools EVERY year. I’m not sure whether the officiating for football AND basketball is simply inept or corrupt…but I’m sure its one or the other and possibly BOTH.