Taunton High students learned from Super Bowl and World Cup referees at clinic

TAUNTON— It's often said to be the best, you need to learn from the best.

Luckily for the students enrolled in Taunton High School's sports officiating class, they received just that during a clinic Tuesday morning.

Through the program's partnership with Sports Officials Care, students received hands on instruction in officiating baseball, soccer, football and basketball from nine professionals who've worked at nearly every level of their respective sports who volunteered to share their expertise.

Among them were former NFL referee Jim Mello, who served as head linesman for Super Bowl XLVIII, as well as 2023 MLS Assistant Referee of the Year Ian McKay, 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup referee Rachel Woo, former MLS and CONCACAF referee and current Assistant Video Assistant Referee (AVAR) Tom Supple, NCAA basketball referee Steve Wilson and umpires Bill McCallum and Jeff Merzel, who've worked in both Major and Minor League Baseball as well as the NCAA College World Series and the Cape Cod Baseball League.

Silver City Football Officials Association members Mike Byron and Jay Roberge also gave instruction along with Mello.

"I thought it was great," Chris Green, who teaches the class along with Brad Koneski, said. "Honestly I didn’t know we were going to have this many (officials) come in. It’s great for the kids and I hope they just take advantage of (the opportunity)."

Students rotated through different stages focusing on particular areas of each sport, such as calling a runner out in baseball or enforcing the offsides rule in soccer, while being able to speak with and make connections with those working professionally.

"It’s cool to know all of their experience and see how far you can really take this," Taunton High junior Johnny Escobalez, who like many of his classmates now works as a youth sports referee, said.

The clinic came about when Sports Officials Care executive director Jennifer Skolochenko-Platt reached out to the school about organizing the event of part of their Game On initiative, a grassroots program targeted at high school-aged students to get them interested in officiating or let them see the role through a new light.

"What a lot of people don’t realize is that there is a huge crisis emerging in youth sports across the board because of a shortage of officials, so to be able to get these young people involved and have them understand that this can be a great opportunity for them to learn and grow and develop leadership skills, but also to make a little extra money and give back to their community is great," Skolochenko-Platt said. "I love the fact that Taunton has this class and that they’re working with (curriculum developer) RefReps. It’s fantastic and I wish it was something that was implemented across the country."

The officials shortage in youth and high school sports was the catalyst for the creation of this class earlier this year, as Green feared with issues of harrassment and other pressures that within a decade there might not be enough officials for games. With the added appeal of a being a part-time job involved in sports for the students, many of whom are athletes themselves, the class has already began to increase officiant numbers in the city.

Following the clinic, the students got to participate in a Q&A session with the officials, who shared stories of how they got their starts, how to deal with unruly players, coaches and parents and where officiating has taken them.

"The level of experience is incredible, but more importantly, it’s the type of people that they are," Taunton High athletic director Mark Ottavianelli, who also works as an umpire himself, said. "They instilled confidence in our kids and our kids understand that they were just like them and they have this opportunity. It’s very important that they understand that and believe in themselves."

As for the officials themselves, they left deeply impressed with the level of expertise the students already displayed, leaving them hopeful for the future of their profession.

"For a high school kid to have this much information, knowledge and know-how in officiating, I haven’t seen it done anywhere else in the country like this," Wilson said. "Taunton is doing it correct, they’re doing it the right way... If we can continue to build on this, we can get officiating back to where it was or even past that to where we have too many officials."

Taunton Daily Gazette sports reporter Cameron Merritt can be reached at cmerritt@tauntongazette.com. You can follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @CamMerritt_News. Support local journalism by purchasing a digital or print subscription to the Taunton Daily Gazette today.

This article originally appeared on The Taunton Daily Gazette: Taunton High sports officials students learn from pros in clinic