Referee Expectations

Core Expectations

Expectation 1

Remain professional and objective at all times. Do not let players antagonize you and do not retaliate for any such attempts. Remain calm at all times and use the following choices of penalties as necessary and appropriate to control players: verbal warnings, yellow cards (awards point to opposing team), player ejections (red card), and player disqualifications (yellow & red card). All yellow and red cards should be reported to the League Officials at the end of the match. League Officials will meet to determine more severe sanctions, if necessary.

Expectation 2

Learn the rules. Referees are expected to learn the current BSD rules located on the BSD website.

It is impossible for one referee to see everything. Here are tips and guidance to help you excel on the stand:

Play Format

There will be a 6 minute warm-up period before the start of each match. Warm-ups for the 7:00pm match should take place before 7pm if possible. Please prepare as much as possible before the previous match ends. Please see the "Match Times and Game Lengths" section of BSD's official rules for details on play format.

Before the Match

Arrive 10 minutes prior to the match, bring the captains together, perform the coin toss (winning captain picks choice of serve/receive or side).
If you like, you can also perform a second coin toss for third game; the winning captain can wait to choose serve/receive or side.
Give 6 minutes warm up time.
While teams warm up, make sure that the benches and score table are within the out of bounds lines between the courts and that there are no chairs, tables or player belongings, between the 10 foot line and the net on each side.
On the scoresheet, record your name for referee, enter the team names, and record the planned start time.

Player Behavior

The captains should be warned during the coin toss that improper behavior will not be tolerated. League officials will review all player ejection and disqualifications and may impose further sanctions, including suspension from the league (usually based on multiple infractions or a particularly severe infraction). There will be no special circumstances for anyone. If a team does not have enough players to continue after an ejection or disqualification, they will forfeit.

Forfeits

For each match of the evening, a grace period of 10 minutes after the scheduled match start time will be allowed before the first game will be forfeited. Each subsequent game of the match will be forfeited every 5 minutes afterward. Play will start as soon as each team has at least 5 players (with the required minimum number of men & women). The score of each forfeited game will be recorded as 25-0. If a team forfeits, the games may still be played; the score, however, will still be recorded as stated above. The referees may choose not to officiate a forfeited game. It is the league officials view that a forfeit should be avoided as much as reasonably possible. If anyone is available to substitute, all attempts should be made to play the match as scheduled.

At the Start of Each Serve

Look for server foot faults.
Check player locations on each team (on the court and in rotation).
For two players to be considered out of rotation, one player must have a foot clearly beyond both feet of the adjacent player.

During Play

Administer time outs, 2 per team per game.
Look for improper/illegal contacts: 4 team hits, multiple hits, held ball

Unless otherwise stated, all USAV rules should be followed for calling illegal contacts. Since calling hand sets can be challenging and contentious, we will clarify the two forms of illegal contact:

Multiple Hits

These are allowed on a team's 1st contact if only one attempt is made to play the ball. Multiple hits are never allowed on a team's 2nd or 3rd contact. These should be called uniformly across all leagues.

Held Ball

The ball is contacted for too long of a time (also called "carry" or "lift" by many people). This applies to all contacts: passes, hand sets, hits, dinks, etc. Before the match begins, you should choose how long you will allow for length of contact and enforce that consistently for every contact throughout the match. BSD typically allows longer contacts in the lower leagues and shorter contacts in the higher leagues, to allow the lower league players more opportunity to develop their skills. One way to be consistent about your held ball calls is to repeat a specific word in your head with each contact and, if you believe any contact goes longer than the word, whistle and signal a held ball. You can choose shorter, quicker words for higher leagues and longer, slower words for lower leagues.

General Points About Calling Illegal Contacts

Above all, be consistent. Strive to enforce the same standards on both teams throughout the match.
Only call illegal contacts that you SEE.
The best way to make illegal contact calls is to anticipate who will next play the ball and zoom your focus in on that person, watching the contact as closely as you can.
A ball spinning as it comes out of a hand set is not necessarily an illegal contact (multiple hit or held ball). It might be a sign that you need to watch the contact more closely.
Realize that you won't always have the best angle to see all contacts, which means sometimes you will miss calling an illegal contact. If your players become especially vocal in criticizing missed calls, you can let the team captains know that you will start giving verbal warnings to those players to improve their conduct.
Referees should not lower their standards because a particular player is struggling to play within the rules. It is the team captain's responsibility to make adjustments for any player not performing well.

End of Games

At end of each game, direct the teams to switch sides and then write down the scores and end time. At the end of the third game, if you are not scheduled to ref but the next ref is not yet there, do the pre-match stuff (call the next match's captains over for the coin toss, etc) so that the next match's warmup proceeds right away.