Reffin' at 80

When you watch Skip Yutzler officiate a high school basketball game you notice he’s in great shape. You notice that he’s in control of the action on the court. You notice that he works well with his fellow officials and coaches alike. What you don’t notice is that the venerable local referee is 80 years old. 

“The long and the short of it is this is my 53rd season of reffing,” Yutzler said after calling a game at the Don Stewart Shootout at Lely High School Saturday. "I started in the 1971-1972 season. At that time, I was coaching JV basketball up in New York. After a couple of years of coaching, I realized that I didn't like what I was seeing in terms of officiating. I thought, ‘You know, I can do this.' So, I took the test, passed the test, and was certified, but I was still coaching. So for the first couple of years, I only worked enough games to pay for my basic dues and uniform expenses, stuff like that. I only did like four or five games a year, but then after seven years of coaching, I started refereeing full time.” 

Yutzler couldn’t be happier with his decision to focus on officiating. 

 "I love officiating,” he said. "It's absolutely fun to be able to be out on the court with these young athletes and be able to run a basketball game the way it should be run. In my estimation, it's a privilege. It's a joy.” 

A fellow official has a word for Yutzler as he leaves the gym following the game. 

“Thanks for having my back,” the official tells Yutzler.  

“Okey doke,” Yutzler answers. 

His comrade blew a call during the game and Yutzler came to his aid after the coach complained to Yutzler, who quickly blew his whistle and ran over to confer with his fellow official. 

"What happened was there was a play underneath on his end of the court,” Yutzler said. "The shooter went up and got fouled. And then as the ball came down, he was the last one to hit it out of bounds. My partner did not call the foul. He probably should have. But he knew he was wrong. So, he put the ball back in play and gave it back to the team who touched it last. Now, you can criticize that call. The result was going to be the same one way or the other. That team was going to get the ball back. The question was whether they were going to get to shoot free throws or not. So, they got the ball back, but of course, the coach on the other end was upset about the out-of-bounds call. I went down and talked to my partner. He said, 'I blew the call.' So, when I went back to the coach I told him what happened, and he was okay with it. It's not the conventional way to do it, but it's kind of a common sense way of dealing with it.” 

That’s just one example of what makes Yutzler a good referee. He said it takes time to become a good official. 

"You know, it's not easy,” he said, "but that does not come when you’re a third-year official. It comes for a ten-year official. After you've been doing this for enough time, you know that you've got to be a little more patient with your whistle sometimes. A lot of times you'll see a kid go to the basket and there's a little contact there, and you're under the basket and you're watching, but you're not sure. And then you see the ball trickle off the rim and you make the call. Now, the coach might say that was a late whistle. My feeling is that's good judgment. The official did not want to call it until he felt he had to call it. So, there's something to be said for experience and the patient whistle. If the ball goes in, we play on. It's just not enough to rise to the extent of a foul. A lot of these calls are 50-50. So you get one where it’s a little on the borderline and you see the ball spin out, I'll call it even if it's late. I would rather my partner be late and right than early and wrong. I don't want them anticipating calls. Let’s play. Let's get the kids running up and down the court. But that's the kind of thing that takes time to learn.” 

Yutzler said it’s important that referees don’t invite trouble with coaches. 

"There's always calls that are right on the borderline,” he said. "I call it a 51-49 type call. It could go either way. And you have to make a decision. Sometimes you make it right, sometimes not. But it happens. And we miss calls, too. The best thing you can do when that happens is to own up to it. We had a situation maybe two years ago, and the coach was really upset with one of my partners about a missed call. I always tell my partners that at halftime we go opposite the bench. Stay on the other side of the court until the bench area clears because if you go right over to the table at halftime, you're serving yourself up on a platter and you're saying, ‘Coach, take a piece of me if you want.' But now, if you all go to the other side of the court, if he's got an issue he can come across the court, and it's one and three. If this guy comes over and he wants to take a piece, three of us are just standing there listening. And he gives us a detailed explanation. And I say to him, ‘Coach, let's for the moment assume that every word you said is 100 percent correct. Where do you want us to go from here? It's over.' There's nothing he can say. It's learning how to address situations. It's an emotional game. You have to learn to address the situations and try to deal with them. We didn't have any trouble with these coaches today. The one guy has a reputation for complaining. He's proud of it." 

Game flow is an important part of refereeing in Yutzler’s estimation. 

"What you don't want to do,” he said, “is be a rule book official. You want to be a guy that uses common sense based on the situation. What you really want more than anything else is flow. You don't want to be out there calling ticky-tack stuff. God knows we've seen plenty of games where the whistle is blowing all night long, and we're taking the ball out of bounds. Here's the way I look at it: in high school basketball especially, I think kids can score in transition, but they don't score when they have to bring the ball in from out of bounds against a set defense. So, to the extent that it's humanly possible, try to stay away from the misdemeanors and grab the felonies. Let's get flow."  

Yutzler also likes to consider whether there was an advantage gained by the potential infraction.  

"If you just suck on your whistle a little bit and hesitate, you might say, ‘No,  there was no advantage gained there.' Contact happens all the time. The question is whether there's an advantage or a disadvantage. If the kid goes to the basket and gets the touch foul and scores, leave it alone. If he goes up and gets a hit and it causes a miss, or he plays through and scores, that's a different situation. It takes time to learn that. It doesn't come automatically. You learn that through years of officiating." 

Yutzler was 27 when he started his career as a referee. Now, he’s on the other side of his officiating career. 

“I’ll go as long as I can,” he said. "That's it. If I can't, I can't. When that happens, it happens.” 

When that time comes, Yutzler has a game plan. 

"I have two thoughts in mind,” he said, "I could become a coach again. Or I could mentor officials. I could go either way. I know coaching is harder than reffing, I can tell you that.” 

For now, Yutzler has proven he can still take a lick. Just last year he took a tremendous hit in a big game he was officiating. 

"Bishop Verot was at First Baptist,” Yutzler said. "Very high level. Very intense game. Verot was on offense and First Baptist was pressing. So, I was hanging back to help out the trail official. I'm the lead. The kid from Verot is running down the sidelines, and he's looking over his shoulder to get an outlet pass. He doesn't know I'm there. I see him coming and I'm backpedaling. But he came on me so hard I had no place to go because the bench was right there. He plowed into me and knocked me head over heels. I sprained both wrists. Had a big contusion on my arm. Big bruise on my hip. A friend of mine was sitting in the stands and said he didn't think I was going to get up. He said he was ready to call 911." 

Not only did Yutzler get up, he finished the game. 

"I think in the moment the adrenaline kicked in. I wasn't able to raise my right arm. I had to referee the game left-handed. It was nasty but I wasn't giving up that game. No way.” 

It’s safe to say that Skip Yutzler is truly a referee who’s earned his stripes.