Incident between Wes Hart and Damon Nahas

A little bit of fact finding mission but also curious to hear what officials think about this incident. The gifs I made here don't catch the pushing in great detail but there was a better replay that I don't have during the broadcast that clearly shows Wes Hart with two hands on the fourth official while he pushed towards the UNC bench. I'm a UNC fan and admittedly biased about the whole play, but I am still curious about the reaction of this community after so much discussion here and on twitter about physical engagement with officials.

The thread also includes a gif of the moment Wes Hart ran on to the field and confronted the officials at the end of the first half. Though it seemed friendly enough, I thought this kind of thing was frowned upon?

This was the confrontation between Wes Hart and Damon Nahas. It started with a physical challenge by an Alabama player that was instead called a foul against UNC's Isabel Cox. You can see the reactions by the coaches & players on the UNC bench. The camera cuts to Cox. pic.twitter.com/Ij2ZHTHKtB

— babs (@babranski) September 11, 2023

 

just for clarification, the handshake where he ran onto the field occurred at halftime. The incident where he received the yellow occurred in the second half.

I assume there's some common sense being applied to certain rules, one of them being that you can't confront an official after a half/game ended. I'm assuming in this incident it wasn't a confrontation so much as an apology perhaps, like you say, ... but it wasn't related the incident that lead to the two yellows.

Correct. A yellow card was given to both coaches in the thread. As a UNC fan obviously I find it a little hard to swallow... the yellows do not feel ... "equitable" ... Nahas stayed in the appropriate area and never physically engaged. Still got a yellow. I've written it off as it being late in the game and the official didn't want to inflame the situation by appearing to have favorites.

 

are you referencing something here or are you basing these comments on what you saw during the broadcast? The way you've worded this, it seems like you've gotten an explanation from someone.

 

All right, I'm not quite sure how to take that explanation. It feels ... naive. It misses the point of concern that's being raised about the behavior with a convenient excuse of "the UNC coach said something".

The growing frustration in the UNC community is that teams are increasingly becoming physical and antagonistic in order to disrupt the game as much as possible. Certainly the championship game against UCLA last year put the effectiveness of that strategy in the spotlight.

While that is generally a valid tactic, especially early in the season, there is concern that it is expanding into more "unorthodox" strategies. We've played three SEC teams in a row in Arkansas, South Carolina, and last night vs Alabama. In all three games we've seen teams go beyond what should be acceptable on field behavior and there's growing concern it has extended to off field bench behavior.

It has been frustrating that some officials, not all but some, seem naive or unwilling to change how they officiate a team when their goals to play with such physicality has been plainly spelled out by multiple coaches so far this season. They want to make UNC uncomfortable physically. They want to toe that line. They want to cross it and see what they can get away with. Arkansas' coach is on record for playing like that against all opponents. Wes Hart, the Alabama Coach, did an interview during half time where he repeatedly talked about frustrating UNC, and while he was deliberately vague, I don't think anybody was left in doubt to what his team was doing to frustrate UNC. It was certainly not anything to do with tactics or possession.

Given that context, it is difficult not to view the incident cynically through the same lens for UNC fans. It is difficult not to see this as another attempt by Wes Hart to antagonize, mock, or intimidate.

and of course one of the most frustrating elements of all of this is when an official is determined to stay as neutral as possible in games and lets it all happen with as minimal adjudication as possible. I think it's one thing to perhaps not be aware of the quality of a team or their history, but when you're in a game where there is clearly a gap in skill and the other team is trying to make up for it with physicality and unsportsmanlike conduct? Is that not something officials are willing to take into consideration?

This of course goes into the greater point of concern UNC fans have had for a while now. UNC Women's has a long and storied history. They're a "blue blood" ... and with that history comes calls from other fan bases of favoritism. You don't have to leave this forum to read fans of other teams post how UNC consistently "got the calls". This has lead to a growing concern that officials are trying to avoid appearing bias in UNC's favor.

Games like this come along and that effort to avoid an appearance of bias in one direction ends up making them bias in another. These SEC games were wild, nearly lawless games because the officials didn't want to appropriately warn the opposing team for their clear unsportsmanlike efforts to physically disrupt the game. Alabama clearly targeted one of UNC's best players in Maycee Bell, fouling her hard and cynically and leaving her on the ground 3 or 4 times in what was a span of only a couple of minutes. Arkansas committed 11 fouls in the first half before they were given a yellow card. That ... can't be OK with persistent infringement in the rules.

Sigh, apologies, I don't mean to rant and I'm not really yelling at any one in particular here. Sometimes it just makes me feel better to get things off my chest by writing them and framing them into words.

Ah, you're right. I double checked and realized I was being thrown off by Alabama's "scoring table" arrangement. I usually look for a table just sitting on the sideline as being the point which you can't cross into, but in this instance it's a much larger building that obscures the 10 yard stretch in comparison.

You can see the 4th react to him after he realized he did step into the no go area when initially during the confrontation he did not (before Wes was pulled away). Do we think that this is why Nahas got his yellow? Certainly that would be worth while, but the non-equity part of it in the moment with what Wes Hart did is still ... annoying.

 

the neutrality you're referring to isn't what I was talking about, so maybe it wasn't the right way to articulate that. Wanting to appear neutral may be more accurate. A neutral official can go into that game against Arkansas and it's likely the Razorbacks have 30 odd fouls called against them by the end of the game. An official who wants to avoid appearing like they were favoring UNC or being harsh against Arkansas would avoid making all those calls, regardless of whether or not they were earned. It's what I think happened in that game (10+ fouls in the first, less than 5 in the second) and also what I think happened in the championship game vs UCLA last year. The officials got to half time, saw that they had called way more fouls against one team than the other, and then decided to loosen or change their standard.

It's not about who wins or lose the game. It's about officials wanting to appear like they did a good job and were fair. A decision to try and avoid looking like they're influencing the game by *not* making important and necessary calls is a decision that can very much influence the game.

 

I ... don't necessarily disagree with what you're saying here, but it feels like we're talking about different things.

I'm talking on the level of the current UNC team, the one that returned all but one starter from last year and has a core with a recent history of struggling to deal with physicality (especially if the officials allow it to happen). I'm not sure how far in advance agreements to play are made (part of me remembers Anson talks to some teams years in advance and says things like "if you come to us next year we'll come to you the year after"). Or it could even be that Anson knew that this team was struggling to deal with it and decided to schedule against tough opponents to test them. At that point I guess you'd say he's just hoping the officials step in before things get crazy and someone gets hurt. We've certainly had a few bumps and bruises along the way, Sam Meza missed some time. Our big target forward Olivia Thomas also got hurt late in the Alabama game and it ... didn't look good. I will say that I'm not sure if that's a connection that can be made because it appeared to be a non-contact injury. Even if she was beat up and fouled a lot in that game, I'm not sure that made the difference with how she came down funny while trying to make a play.

How these kind of games lead to injuries and adds to the wear in tear in a condensed season is a whole other topic of discussion, but it's also a point of concern when talking about why NCAA officials let things get so physical. You can't officiate this league the same way you might the NWSL or Intl levels until these players have the same kind of rest and access to recovery those players do. This team played a difficult opponent in South Carolina at their place on Thursday, got 2 days rest, and then played another difficult opponent. UNC and Anson maybe can pick and choose their opponents, but they don't decided when games are played.

 

When you say "there's only so much a referee can do" to moderate a team that has obviously chosen to play a more physical game ... what do you mean by that? Are you referring to setting a standard early and then wanting to avoid changing that standard because a team starts to play differently mid game? I agree with that 100%.

However I'm more referring to teams that start and end games with physicality on the mind. Arkansas in particular, from the very get, was obviously trying to send a message. Seems like that should be something an official can recognize and adjust to.

Ah this also plays into a little bit of the conference alignment mess, only at the officiating level. I didn't buy in too much with the idea that different conference officials have differing standards, at least not to the extreme degree that most people seem to think. I didn't realize though that conferences were responsible for training? That ... seems like a can of worms.

That being said, this is on a higher level again than what I was talking at. I'm more thinking about, say, how an official should change their officiating standard when they're doing a U13 girls game compared to an NWSL game. Technically the rules are the same, at least to my understanding they mostly are ... but certainly you change your approach with regard to physicality, yes? And if yes, I don't see why we can't also do that with College games knowing that it's a condensed schedule where overly physical play has a greater impact on the athletes than they would at different levels.

and just like what was stated above I will reply that I'm not talking about officials have favorites or wanting one team to win or not. I'm talking about officials wanting to avoid APPEARING to have a favorite. If anything your sentiments in this paragraph reinforces my concern that officials might enter games worried TOO much about wanting to appear as neutral and unbiased as possible. So much so that the way that they officiate becomes biased and provides favor to one team. "I've called a lot of fouls against team A and I don't want to call too many more fouls against them than I do against team B so I'll loosen my standards and let more go."

My example would be the Arkansas game. Say an official makes 30+ foul calls in that game and an Arkansas official complains that too many fouls were called against? Is that something someone looks at, sees the foul call count and ... what? Is that bad enough to influence what you're concerned about?

 

You're not wrong, and I already admitted as much that I was venting. I guess to that end it is my prerogative on an open forum to be able to vent as long as I'm following the rules of the forum, especially in a thread of my own making. I didn't mean to derail the conversation or mislead you into reading my rants, it just happened after the conversation at hand seemed to come to its conclusion. It is also your prerogative not to engage and respond if you don't like what I'm posting. I also don't see why I can't both vent but also engage in a real discussion. Despite what you say, there have been some *good* discussions mixed into the threads I have created. Mainly ones I'm not involved in but nevertheless they have existed.

I will say that I'm not here to criticize referees, you, others, folks on this thread. My biggest issue is more the system that they work in and how influences them to officiate games in ways that aren't good for the beautiful game. The rules and their implementation can and should be improved to make it even more beautiful, and not necessarily because anybody thinks it's wrong or broken or because officials are bad at their jobs, but because any professional worth their salt should always be looking to improve.

I've been watching and playing and yes, even officiating rec soccer for most of my 40 odd years. What major rule or system change has soccer been through that has stuck? Offside was changed in 1990. 1992 saw a rule change that prevented you from being able to pick up the ball with your hands as a goal keeper if it was deliberately kicked back to you. I vaguely remember a trial to have an official on the goal line. Then there was VAR which we're still not sure today will stick in its current implementation. What else? That's 30+ years of next to nothing.

Every other major sport has had dramatic changes recently. Hockey as an example in 2006 dramatically changed interference rules to open the game up and allow for more scoring. Soon after they dramatically changed OT first to 4 skaters, then soon after 3 when they weren't satisfied with the product. Then in the 2010's they added two officials to the ice and implemented significant video review that dwarfs VAR standards. Significant changes in the rules interpretation when it came to contact to the head that had MAJOR impact on the sport. The list just goes on and on and that's just the last 20 years.

Surely it wouldn't hurt to try *one* EPL or MLS season where a second official is on the field, maybe responsible for one half of the field and then gives the other official on the field another pair of eyes at a different angle when the ball goes to the other side of the field ... just like an AR.

It feels less like soccer is struggling to move forward and more like it's being held back, and it's exasperating to someone who the sport means so much to and knows it can be made so much better if we would just .. try ... it doesn't have to always be right ... just ... try ..

another rant ... I'm sorry. I think all the necessary questions from the initiial conversations have been answered so without direction I'm just ... yea. Thank you all for the answers and insight you have given.

 

lol I didn't think I worded it in a way for there to be something to "bite", but thank you for the reply anyway. That entire vent was less looking for something specific to change and more just wanting to see more effort to improve the game in general. I don't care in particular what they changed in what order, I just wanted to see more concerted effort to improve. It's a rather extreme position to take to think good changes can't be made beyond just "tinkering". There's a middle ground between your "tinkering" and the major fundamental changes to the game that would require a test league.

Perhaps there are limitations compared to other sports when you take the scope of soccer in consideration, but I'm not so sure hockey is the best example. They also have a world wide governing body that also has a set of rules it uses for international tournaments. There not terribly different from the NHL and with everything I've heard when something changes in the nhl that is generally well liked and received, the IIHF usually adopts it and vice versa. I know the relationship between the NHL and the IIHF is way different than the one for FIFA, domestic leagues, and the NCAA, but ... the example is set. I feel like that might lead into a whole different kind of conversation about how much control FIFA has over domestic leagues in those regards, but I don't wanna go there.

I've seen a lot of references to the two referee experiment that officials continuously cite as being a complete failure. Do you have more information I can read about that? I can't seem to find anything on my own beyond the AR experiment on the goal lines in UEFA that hasn't gone anywhere.

but if I'm being completely honest ... no shit you wouldn't like that. Pardon my language, but when it comes to the idea of splitting control of a game between two officials the person whose opinion I would be the *most* skeptical of would be the officials. When the NHL did it the officials in that league raged and complained and decried the end is nigh endlessly because of course they did. The intuitive and common sense reasoning behind the failure of the two referee experiment is that the powers that be didn't want to pay more money to officials per game and the officials didn't want to split duties and give up control per game. Of course I want to read about it more, but for now that's what my intuition is telling me.

as for what I would like to see? I like going back to the 2006 sweeping changes the NHL implemented and would love to see something similar for soccer. Wide ranging changes to improve the number of attacking chances, increase goal scoring, etc etc. Offside could be changed to allow over the back, let players have a chance to get back on side before play can continue, and even make it so that offside is only called if the offside player was the player to score, with "influencing the play" having their own set of similar rules as well.

I'd see more clearly defined and tighter enforced rules as to what is and isn't a physical foul. They're too vague and open to interpretation for me in the IFAB rule book. Things like players smashing into the back of another player while the later is trying to shield the play out of bounds needs to go entirely, imo. Positioning isn't rewarded enough in the game right now.

I'm wary of changing anything in the 18 slash PK department unless it improves the *attacking* football. I do think the current set up could use a tweak as it can feel very harsh sometimes with PK's, but it's a conundrum without any obvious solution or even obvious tweak to try.
Perhaps limit the number of defending players who can be in the 18 at any given time? Maybe instead of the 18 limit how many defenders can be in a half.

Hopefully you get the generally idea of the kind of changes I'd like to see. Open the game up and increase the attacking action! Gosh I sound like a little kid reading that out loud, but hey, I think you understand what I'm going for ...

 

are there any non-referee opinions about the two referee experiment that is cited so much that I can read about?

@soccerref69420 wasn't I on your list already? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯