Early schedule changes to prep-sports as referee shortage persists

QUINCY (WGEM) – High school prep sports are only just getting underway, but schools across the Tri-States are already feeling the affects of a shortage of licensed Illinois High School Association (IHSA) officials.

This week, Quincy Public Schools announced a game originally scheduled for Friday, Oct. 4 would now be moved to that Thursday. A soccer match in Macomb was postponed for the same reason.

According to the IHSA, there were 9,702 officials during the 2021-2022 season statewide, and there are now 11,545. An increase of over 2,000 officials, but IHSA Assistant Executive Director Matt Troha said while the trend is positive, it doesn’t reflect that of the entire state.

Regions like western Illinois, for example, are still working with less.

In Dec. 2022, the IHSA Board of Directors passed a provisional license, where 15 and 16-year-olds can go through the necessary steps to become an official. A provisional license allows a young referee to work with an experienced referee in youth sports, junior high school and low-level high school games. For example, freshman and sophomore outings.

“The average age of officials continues to go up. I think that many of our officials now are getting into officiating later in life,” Troha said.

Troha hopes the provisional license measure will attract and retain referees for the years ahead. Since the instatement of the provisional license, Troha said the IHSA has issued 391 provisional licenses. The top cities being Chicago, 18, then Bloomington, 13, Ashland, 10, Washington, 9, Robinson, 8 and Elmwood with 6.

The top sport for a provisional licensed official is baseball with 64. Football is the third ranked sport with 41.

Quincy Notre Dame Athletic Director Bill Connell has been at the helm of Raiders athletics for nearly 30 years. He believes the last few years to be the hardest regarding referee numbers.

When Connell first started, he said QND could pull from roughly 20 crews of licensed IHSA football referees. He claims that number has now dwindled to only 2 crews locally.

“Most of our crews come out of the Springfield area, St. Louis area, Decatur area,” Connell said.

Connell said it isn’t uncommon to use long-distance crews for junior-varsity games, either. Mileage and gas also comes along with the cost of paying for an official.

“When I would have started in 1992, a varsity football official would have made $45, now that going rate right now is $150,” he said.

Referees like John Hynek started officiating as a way to make extra money. Hynek, of Quincy, coaches youth teams, but has been a soccer referee for over 20 years. He said it turned into a passion, but after some summers of 600 to 800 games, it began to feel like a job.

He trimmed that down to about half that amount.

Hynek believes spectators are a key to helping get more refs in the game. In his time as a ref, he said that is what’s diminished the most.

“Now it’s like all these parents are reliving their glory years through their kids now,” Hynek said.

Hynek believes the shortage of referees is not significant to the U.S. On a trip to England to see his brother’s high school team, they didn’t have enough refs, and Hynek was asked to step in.

“You gotta have thick skin, yes, true, but in the same sense you gotta know we’re taking time away from our families, we’re just trying to make a few extra dollars,” Hynek said.

Connell echoed Hynek’s sentiments that fans, while still remaining enthusiastic about the game, play a factor if referees decide to stick it out.

“The bottom line is if you know the rules that great, maybe you should become an official,” Connell said.

Connell said he talked to QND’s head football coach Wednesday morning that a reschedule could happen, but so far the Raiders faithful has been able to manage.

Applications to become an IHSA official can be accessed here.

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