After teasing us that they were considering allowing the ref to keep the official time, the committee decided to retain the clock rule while changing a number of inconsequential rules. This is super disappointing as I absolutely loathe the current clock rule. NCAA announcement: https://www.ncaa.com/news/soccer-me...r?cid=NCAASoccer_tw_sf187976504&sf187976504=1
Until they get the substitution patterns straightened out it doesn't make sense. International game has a max of six subs over 90 minutes... College has six subs in the first 20 minutes... I think with a year long schedule and calendar, moving closer to FIFA in terms of sub limits... then adding the referee controlled clock will make more sense... as long as the rules that Division III women have are the same as Division I Men, it will be very tough to make significant changes to the rules. 438 Division III Women's Programs most of whom have objectives are much different than the top D1 Men's programs like Stanford, Indiana, Wake Forest, North Carolina's of the world...but yet still get to vote the same... Come to think of it, it is a little like FIFA. ;-)
Don't get me wrong, the clock thing is annoying, but...it's rather trivial in all the things wrong with college soccer.
Refs in every other level than college keep the time. But because the scoreboard operator keeps the official time, errors occur frequently, dozens of times per season. I've seen the scoreboard operator forget to start the clock, miss the signal to stop the clock, not paying attention, one college doesn't know when to start the clock (on whistle or contact), etc. Most scoreboard operators have no clue on the rules - even some SID aren't extremely familiar. But it's not always the press box mistakes, many refs forget to signal to stop the clock, I believe because it's an anomaly for the refs.
Yes. Referees are also known to be infallible, especially when it comes to timekeeping. No one dare yell at a referee.