NEW YORK — Veteran coach Cheryl Reeve has seen a lot of improvements in the officiating of WNBA games this year, and the collective progress by referees has helped the league set offensive records over the first half of its 30th season.
There are still areas that need to be worked on, but it will take more than 20 games for everything to be cleaned up.
“We’ve seen great improvements on the very things that were broken,” said Reeve, who recently became the league’s career leader in coaching wins. “There was a level of impeding players and trying to cut off a screen. We don’t want the unnecessary physicality.”
In the most recent offseason, the league put together a task force — which includes Reeve, who was inducted this summer into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame — in the offseason to help clean up some of the physicality in the game. The main point of emphasis was to help players’ freedom of movement.
Despite some hiccups early on, it has led to more offense as teams entered Thursday averaging close to 86 points a game, the highest ever, and shooting nearly 45% from the field, also the best in league history. So far this season, there have been roughly 4 1/2 more fouls called per game, with 75% of them being nonshooting fouls.
“I think it’s fair for our coaches and players to be able to say, ‘We’re happy, and we think positive things are taking place, but still I disagree with the calls that are affecting our team tonight,'” Monty McCutchen, who is the head of WNBA officials, told The Associated Press.
“I want coaches to remain advocates for their teams,” McCutchen added. “We have gotten positive feedback that we’re on the right track. We’ll continue to work through specifics when we fail that task, and we’ll continue to check in with the officiating task force to make sure that we’re aligned with the expectations.”
By no means are things perfect. Coaches and players have complained of inconsistencies between officiating crews. What might be called a foul in one half might not be deemed a foul at another point in the game. Obvious fouls are getting missed, too.
“It’s never going to be perfect, but we’re trending in the right direction,” Reeve said. “We’ve put resources into this.”
Reeve recalled a play that she asked to be reviewed during a game against the Dallas Wings. The officials looked at the play and upgraded it to a flagrant fouls.
The league is constantly reviewing plays. Phoenix Mercury forward Alyssa Thomas’ punch to the throat of Indiana Fever guard Caitlin Clark that was upgraded to a Flagrant-2 was one of four fouls the league reviewed that night and was the only one upgraded.
Common fouls aren’t the only thing on the rise; both technical fouls and flagrant fouls are up, too. Going into Thursday, there had been 124 technicals assessed this season (four more were rescinded). Last year, there were 171 total. There were 44 flagrants called this season entering Thursday, compared to 51 all of last year.
“I think they are doing a better job at reviewing hostile acts,” Reeve said. “We didn’t ask for that, but if that’s what it takes to clean it up.”
Not everyone is a fan of all the reviews.
Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon said after her reigning league champions’ loss to Indiana last week that there were too many of them.
“It’s exhausting when they go to the review every time. I mean, these games are getting longer and longer. It’s encouraging more drama,” Hammon said. “So it’s like somebody gets hit, and it’s like, take them to the hospital. And they jump up, and they’re fine. So I actually think it’s not just today. It’s across the league. There’s so many reviews.”