Last youth games for the year
Today was the last youth games of the year - the finals in the state tournament. One of the great things this state tournament was the number of assessors there; although most did not get full assessments like I did yesterday, there wasn't a day where at least one of the games had an assessor for half a game to help coach us. It was great, because you're able to get feedback from multiple perspectives, and see if there was any improvement over time. As far as the number and amount of people out there just to help the referees, it was better than Regionals.The center I had was the 2nd division final for the 13-year-old boys; the game was pretty clean, very fast, and moderately physical. The winner was definitely ready for the first division. I hate to say that it wasn't terribly challenging, but honestly, it wasn't. I didn't slough off (it's hard to at the age, because even if they didn't play "boom ball" by the strictest sense, there still wasn't a whole lot of midfield play - so I was moving pretty constantly), but there was nothing that caught me off-guard, nobody was pissed off after the game - we just moved onto the second game (where I was the fourth official).
I did learn something though, which is the important part. It was suggested that I move more toward center when there are substitutions, that I'm cutting off part of the field from my vision - and while it didn't matter in this game, it would in harder games.
Something to remember when high school games come up, or in one of the few remaining adult games left.