Ithaca League of Women Rollers

Non-skating officials

At every bout, we try to have 7 referees. That may sound like a lot, but they depend very heavily on an even larger number of non-skating officials.

This page described the duties of the non-skating officials, as well as indicates what they need in order to perform their jobs.

Positions

Inside Score Keeper (2)

Description

Each inside score keeper is assigned to a team. The jammer ref for that team will, after each pass, relay the number of points his/her jammer got on that pass. The inside score keeper's job is to tally up those points for the jam, and then relay that information to the official score keeper at the end of each jam.

Prior to the start of the bout, the inside score keepers should talk with the official score keeper and the secondary official score keeper to work out exactly how they're going to relay the jam score to the official score keepers and how the official score keepers will confirm that they got the information.

Things to Know

1. Each jammer referee wears a colored wrist band on their arm. This denotes which team's jammer they're watching.
2. Bouts are noisy and so jammer referees will rarely say what the points are. Typically, they hold up the number of points on one of their hands (there are a maximum of five points possible per pass, which conveniently fits on a single hand). You should therefore always look at your referee as soon as his/her jammer breaks through the pack. (Watching them more often doesn't hurt.)
3. Jammer referees alternate the teams that they watch at each period break. This means that you change which jammer referee you're watching with the period break.
4. Make sure to identify yourself to your jammer referee so that they know who to relay points to.
5. Make sure that when you communicate your points, you're also clearly communicating which team that it's for. You can hope that the official score keeper will always correctly remember your face with the team that you're counting for, but helping them is better.

Inside Penalty Tracker (3)

There is one primary inside penalty tracker, and two inside penalty tracker's assistants. The primary penalty tracker is responsible for keeping a list of all of the penalties assigned to players on both teams. A large whiteboard will be provided for this purpose, it should be layed out with the home team on the left and the away team on the right.

The referees will give penalties to any one of the primary or assistant penalty trackers, and it's the job of the assistant penalty trackers to keep track of all of the penalties coming in and to make sure that they get written down.

One of the assistant penalty trackers will be responsible for frequently looking to the outside penalty trackers for penalties to be relayed in.

One of the assistant penalty trackers will be responsible for informing the inside referees when a player has received four minor penalties and needs to serve 1 minute in the penalty box. They will have some sort of hand-flag to be used to get a referees attention when this happens. They should also notify a referee when a player has gone to the box too many times and needs to be removed from the period (see below).

Things to Know

1. Referees will typically assign a penalty in the form Color-Number-Severity-Type. E.g. "Red 34 minor hands" or "Green 22 major cutting".
2. The outside penalty trackers will not necessarily be in front of you. Make sure to check with shortly after the pack passes them, every time the pack passes them (you have to expect a little lag time for the outside referee to report the penalty and for the outside penalty tracker to write it down). Their ability to get their penalties to you relies on you looking at them.
3. When you record a penalty from an outside penalty tracker, make sure to acknowledge it to them so that they can erase it on their whiteboard and get ready for the next penalty.
4. Referees do their best to correctly read the numbers of each player, but it doesn't always work out. You can rely on getting penalties for numbers which don't exist on the roster. First, pay attention to when the referee identifies the team, because they could be reporting it to the wrong person. Second, if there's someone that they obviously mean, just assign the penalty accordingly. Using your discretion, if you're pretty confident of your interpretation, is better than keeping the referee from watching the game for an extended period of time to haggle out the number. If you have to ask the referee who they meant, do it during the same jam, while the player is still on the track and the referee can look for them.
5. Minor penalties carry through periods, so if a player had two minors at the end of one period, they start the next with two minors. You don't want to write the minors on the board twice (they should only appear on the board in the period in which they were assigned), but you do need to be aware of it so that you can properly alert the referees when someone has 4 minors.
6. If a player receives an excessive number of penalties in a period, they should be thrown out of the game for the rest of the period. If this happens, flag a referee. Excessive means:

   In a 2 period bout:

   3 majors, 12 minors, or 4 trips for any reason.

   In a 3 period bout:

   4 majors, 16 minors, or 5 trips for any reason.

7. When recording penalties, if the referee gives you a penalty type, please record it using the Handy Dandy Penalty Abbreviation Chart. Once a person gets 4 minor penalties, circle the four abbreviations.
8. Please use a different colored marker for each period, so that we can tell in which period the skaters got their penalties.

Outside Penalty Tracker (2)

The outside penalty trackers stand toward the outside of the track boundary zone, near the end of the the straight-aways. Their job is to receive the penalties from the outside pack referees and relay them as quickly as possible to the inside penalty trackers. The penalty tracker uses a whiteboard to do this, indicating 3 things: Team color, player number, and the penalty. If they have time, the outside penalty tracker can write down the full penalty which was reported ("cutting the track", "blocking out of bouds", "blocking with hands", etc.). If time is more critical, "Major" or "minor" is acceptable.

In addition to writing down the particular penalty being communicated to the inside penalty tracker in large print in the middle of the white board, the outside penalty tracker may need to keep small notes on the board of the penalties which have not yet been communicated. Each penalty tracker should work out their own system for doing this, but be sure that it's small enough that no one but themselves is likely to read it, so that penalties only get communicated once. When not communicating a penalty, the outside penalty trackers should hold their white boards so that the inside penalty trackers can't see the face of the white board.

Things to Know

1. Referees will typically assign a penalty in the form Color-Number-Severity-Type. E.g. "Red 34 minor hands" or "Green 22 major cutting".
2. When relaying a penalty, please try to use the penalty codes from the Handy Dandy Penalty Abbreviation Chart.
3. Usually, the first letter of the color suffices to indicate which color it is.
4. Prior to the start of the bout, you should talk to the inside penalty trackers to make sure they understand how you're going to write down penalties.

Official Score Keeper (1)

The official score keeper receives the jam scores from the inside score keepers, and keeps a running tally of the points scored on a piece of paper, broken down by jam. (Preferably, the score keeper will indicate where the periods start and end in the tally.)

The official score keeper is also responsible for updating the electronic score board with the up-to-date score information. Depending on the score board, the official score keeper may also be responsible for running the period clock. The head referee (or his/her delegate) will make sure that the official score keeper is familiar with the operation of the electronic score board.

When possible, the official score keeper should indicate on the score sheet, for each jam: who each jammer was, indicate who was called lead jammer (if anyone) by marking an L next to her number, and indicating whether each jammer was sent to the penalty box by putting a B next to her number.

Things to Know

1. Make sure to work out with the inside score keepers how you're going to acknowledge when you've received their score. Make sure that it's distinct for each inside score keeper, so they know which of them you're acknowledging.
2. It's more important to keep track of the score than to know who the jammers were, or who was lead jammer. If you miss the score while looking up other information, no one is likely to remember it accurately after the next jam starts. Ideally you'll figure out who the jammer is at the start of the jam, and write the scores down at the end of the jam, so that this won't be a problem.
3. According to wftda rules, a jam which starts with less than 2 minutes on the period clock still runs to its natural completion. If the electronic score board has a buzzer when the period clock expires, make sure to silence the buzzer if the jam hasn't finished. If possible, activate the buzzer after the jam to make it clear that the period is over.

Secondary Official Score Keeper (1)

The secondary official score keeper independently keeps the same score record that the official score keeper does. The purpose is to have two independent records which can be confirmed against each other. (Ask the official score keeper for what he or she wants you to do, and how they're going to be keeping track of the scores.)

Penalty Box Timer (2)

Each penalty box timer is responsible for administering the penalties for one team. Each penalty box timer is assigned one team for the entire bout. Their job is to time each skater in the penalty box and let the skater know when their time is up and they may rejoin play. The penalty starts when the skater sits down in the penalty box, and lasts for 1 minute unless otherwise directed by a referee.

For each team, there are two seats for blockers and 1 seat for a jammer. The jammer seat will be marked with a large star on it. Only jammers may sit in the jammer seat, and only blockers may sit in the blocker seats. Please note that the pivot is a blocker.

Each team may have a maximum of two blockers and 1 jammer in the penalty box. If both of the blocker seats are currently taken when a blockers comes up, the penalty box timer will wave the new skater off, and she'll serve her penalty when one of the blockers leaves the penalty box. In this case, the penalty box timer should flag one of the outside refs and communicate that it's time for the other skater to serve her penalty. (This means that the penalty box timer needs to get the waved off skater's number prior to waving the skater off.)

Things to Know

1. You should tell the player when there are 10 seconds left in her penalty. When there are 10 seconds left, she is supposed to stand up.
2. When a player is about to leave the penalty box, it would be helpful to remind them to re-enter the pack from the rear, even if this means that they have to wait for the pack to pass them. They can get penalties for joining in the front or middle of the pack.

Materials

In general, each person assigned to a team will receive a brightly colored bandana that they must wear in some obvious fashion (on their head, on their arm, etc). Bright red will be given to people who are recording for the home team, and bright blue for the away team. It is imperative that these colors be bright -- dark colors will get lost admit all of the darkly colored safety gear.

These are the same colors that will be used for the jammer referees, so that the color coding is consistent.

The colors may be altered to match the team colors playing, provided that the colors are bright. Neon or electric is preferably: the bandanas must be recognizeable at 100 feet away. This requirement is important, and failure to meet it will result in confusion and the bout going less smoothly. If the colors are altered to match team colors, the marker and flag colors should likewise be altered to be as similar as possible.

Inside Score Keepers

• 2 small white boards (minimum 8"x10")
• 2 whiteboard markers (1 red, 1 blue)
• 2 bandanas (1 bright red, 1 bright blue)
• 2 whiteboard erasers
• 2 chairs

Inside Penalty Trackers

• 2 extra large (3'x4') white boards, set up according to the penalty tracking guide
• 2 methods of holding the white boards up so that they can be written against
• minimum of 4 white board markers, 2 black, 2 some other color.
• The inside penalty trackers do not get any erasers.
• Note: if large white boards are not available, those giant pads of paper and permanent markers will do just fine.
• Some sort of straight edge to help the penalty trackers draw straight lines, 1 will be fine since this is only needed during setup.
• 2 of some sort of hand-flag, to catch referees attention. (1 bright red, 1 bright blue)
• 2 bandanas (1 bright red, 1 bright blue)
• 2 chairs

Outside Penalty Trackers

• 2 large white boards (minimum 18"x24")
• 2 whiteboard markers (1 red, 1 blue)
• 2 whiteboard erasers
• 2 bandanas (1 bright red, 1 bright blue)
• 2 chairs

Official Score Keeper

• 1 electronic score board
• 2 pieces of paper
• 1 pen
• 1 chair

Secondary Official Score Keeper

• 2 pieces of paper
• 1 pen
• 1 chair

Penalty Box Timers

• 6 stop watches
• 2 Penalty boxes
• 2 Jammer penalty chairs
• 2 bandanas (1 bright red, 1 bright blue)
• 2 Chairs for the penalty box timers