SPHL Officiating

This season, the SPHL hired a director of officiating, instead of having league commissioner Jim combs try to oversee on-ice game officials, along with all his other duties.

The hiring of Scott Brand of USA Hockey is designed to upgrade the calling of SPHL games. Brand is the coordinator for development of officials. "He's got over 8 guys that he has grouped from junior hockey all the way to the national hockey league," SPHL Commissioner Jim Combs said. "I definitely think it will improve the officiating. Now we're dealing with the full-time officials who do nothing but referee hockey. A lot of the officials come from junior hockey and they're used to dealing with 16, 17, 18 year olds and now they have to step up into this right away and they're dealing with men so it's a little bit different, but that's a good way to break them into the league."
"My famous quote to our owners used to be that we have the best officials in our price range and what we were paying versus what we were getting was exactly what we paid for. A referee gets paid $200 a game, he does not get paid any travel and his hotel room is taken care of the night of the game. It's not a get-rich-quick plan, anybody that wants to look at officiating as a get-rich-quick plan is really in the wrong business. They do it because they love the game, they have a passion for it, they want to be continue to be involved in it, and they have an opportunity with Scott and the SPHL to hone their skills here and go to the ECHL, American hockey league, and eventually all the way to the NHL"

"Scott brand has been to our arena several times and he takes the time to sit with us after the game and get our opinions, but also we're rating these officials every game and he's reading because he lets us know what he agrees, disagrees, so it's a real hands-on learning experience,” Ice Bears coach Scott Hillman said. "We have to remember they're here to develop, they're very young and they are learning, every mistake that's made they're learning from it. And we have to keep that in mind, and obviously emotions get very heated and but at the end of the day - I'm under the understanding that we're here to help those guys, just like they're here to help us."

And as part of the officials' development, the SPHL is using an NHL-approved 4-man system for 15 regular season games.

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