Officiating Caitlin Clark? Refs weigh in on heated dynamic: ‘We’re pros. Not perfect’

INDIANAPOLIS — The bruises on Caitlin Clark‘s forearms and knees have been on the knees and forearms of WNBA rookies for decades, long before Clark burst onto the professional basketball court making waves the women’s sport has never seen. Bo Boroski is sure of that.

The treatment the Indiana Fever rookie superstar — dubbed by some as the savior of women’s basketball — is getting on the court is par for the game. The rough shoves and swipes and sometimes scratches and smacks are nothing new, and nothing any rougher than other newcomer to professional sports has endured.

Even the flagrant foul to Clark’s head when Angel Reese was going for a block in Sunday’s game against the Sky. Even the Chennedy Carter hip-check flagrant foul against Clark two weeks ago. People seem to forget those fouls have happened plenty of times in the WNBA — and on every other court across the world from youth to pro men’s.

“I think what’s changed is the amount of focus due to the explosion in popularity of the sport,” said Boroski, who spent more than 20 years as a basketball official, finishing his career refereeing three straight men’s NCAA Final Fours. “So, you’ll never convince me the level of physicality in any sport has changed as much as the public would like to believe.”

Where the calls and the plays against and for Clark gets compounded is when other variables are brought into the equation, such as social media and other players within the league, he said.

“And it compounds into a, ‘We’ve never seen this before’ moment,” said Boroski. “We have seen it. And by the way, she’s handling it with extreme grace.”

After the flagrant foul to Clark’s head Sunday by Reese in the Fever win against the Sky, Clark said it was “just a part of basketball. It is what it is. Trying to make a play on the ball, get the block. It happens.”

Reese said the foul was not intentional, calling it a “basketball play.”

The way Clark is being officiated, the calls and non-calls, the three technical fouls she’s accumulated, the flagrant hits, the grabs and the flopping from both sides has been scrutinized in a way no other player in the WNBA has been subject to before.

“I don’t think this is some new phenomenon. I think she’s being challenged because of who she is and the talent she is,” said Boroski. “And from an officiating focus, I think the WNBA has the appropriate mechanisms in place to make sure that it is taken care of.”

As Boroski sees it, there are three opportunities for Clark’s opponents to be held accountable.

“The most obvious mechanism is during real time when they witness acts against her, they have the opportunity. They also have the opportunity in-game at the replay monitor,” he said. “And then the league has a third mechanism to right any wrongs as it relates to flagrant acts.”

After that, all that’s left is the armchair referees in their living rooms making their own calls on whether Clark is being officiated fairly or not.

‘We hold our officials accountable’

The criticism of WNBA officials by fans — many now watching the league for the first time because of Clark — comes with plenty of misnomers about their training, pay and ability. In reality, the path to becoming a WNBA referee is just as stringent as landing in the NBA, said Monty McCutchen, the NBA’s senior vice president of referee development and training.

The league’s scouting department looks at more than 3,500 officials a year, then narrows the pool down to the top 100 candidates, which attend a grassroots camp. Out of that camp, the NBA takes the top 48 to 50 officials to a mid-level camp where 30 are chosen for an elite camp. At that camp, only a handful of finalists are chosen to officiate the NBA’s developmental G League.

Once in the G League, about one in five officials will make it to the NBA or the WNBA, said McCutchen.

“The norm is that you are in our pipeline for several years, two, three, four years, before you ever make the G League,” said McCutchen, a former NBA official. “Our referees have heard our messages of training for five, six, eight, nine years before they ever see a WNBA player. To suggest that they aren’t trained is not accurate.”

Once in the league, the average years of service for WNBA officials is eight, with more than a third having more than 10 years of experience, McCutchen said. Beginning salary is about $1,500 a game and, for more experienced officials, reaches more than $2,500.

“We’re pros,” said McCutchen. “But being a pro does not make you perfect. And most certainly, we at every level make mistakes. And when we do, we hold our officials accountable.”

One thing McCutchen wants to make very clear is that nothing has changed with WNBA officiating just because Clark has come into the league.

“We don’t referee any individual player any different than any other individual player,” he said. “The idea that we would ever separate a player out would go to the heart of what our integrity-based work is all about.”

‘A big part of refereeing is perception, unfortunately’

Take a peek at social media during a Fever game and one of the trending topics is inevitably the state of the officiating of the game. Some allege Clark continually gets hammered with no foul called. Others say she’s getting away with committing fouls. Still others say she is getting tick-tack fouls called against her, that she whines to the officials too much, that she flops.

“At any higher level of officiating, you have public perception and then you have the inner workings,” said Cory Furman, a men’s college basketball official at the Division II level. “And sometimes the perception is not always right. But a big part of refereeing is perception, unfortunately. And that’s just the world we live in.”

As of June 17, Clark had 43 total fouls, an average of 2.9 per game, three of those technical fouls, and she had made 58 of 64 free throws (90.6%). After the Carter flagrant foul June 1, Clark spoke out about the physicality.

“I think everybody is physical with me, they get away with things that probably other people don’t get away with,” she said. “It’s tough, but that’s just the fact of the matter. This is a very physical game, and you’re going to get pressure. This is professional basketball.”

As a men’s college basketball official, Furman said he and his colleagues receive multiple memos from the powers that be outlining points of emphasis in officiating games.

“I can tell you that at that level, every play is critiqued, every game is analyzed regardless if you’re talking about Caitlin Clark or anybody else, each play is heavily scrutinized by leadership,” said Furman. “I guarantee you her name has come up in the memos sent out to the WNBA officials but, at the same time, they have to be careful because they don’t want to officiate her any differently than anybody else. There’s got to be some equity there. And obviously, public perception doesn’t feel that way.”

Furman said he can’t imagine the pressure the officials feel when Clark’s on the court.

“You’ve already got a difficult league to officiate (due to abilities among the players) and now you put all these eyeballs and the storylines around Caitlin Clark, and you can almost start playing mind games with yourself at times as a referee,” he said. “When you think about, ‘If this was player XYZ, I know I’ve got to make this call, but gosh, it’s Caitlin Clark …’

“And then you really can’t do that as a referee. You’ve got to officiate the game, no matter who’s on the floor, no matter what jersey’s out there.”

Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on X: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Officiating Caitlin Clark? Refs weigh in. ‘We’re pros. Not perfect’