NCAA removed an official at halftime of NC State women’s tournament game. Here’s why
The NCAA removed one of the on-court officials from duty at halftime of Saturday’s N.C. State-Chattanooga women’s basketball NCAA Tournament first round game after discovering a conflict of interest.
Tommi Paris, part of the three-person officiating crew, worked the first half alongside Edward Sidlasky and Karen Preato before the switch was made.
According to Paris’ LinkedIn page, she earned a master’s degree in public administration from Chattanooga and was born in the city. She attended Furman University for her undergraduate degree.
Rick Nixon, NCAA associate director of media coordination, said officials are required to disclose their school affiliations when being considered for working championships.
“In this instance, that wasn’t disclosed,” Nixon told the News & Observer. “It’s important to note that conferences don’t do this during the regular season. They don’t have the same conflict restrictions.”
When asked if the NCAA has the resources to fact check submissions, Nixon said, “I’m not gonna answer that. I’m not really sure where that’s headed. We asked for backgrounds that they provide. That’s the information that we have. In this particular instance, it wasn’t disclosed.
“We’ve always asked for that information to be provided, and we can only go based on what we what we have in front of us.”
Angelica Suffren, who officiated the Green Bay-Tennessee game that preceded the N.C. State-Chattanooga game, worked the second half of the game between the Mocs and Wolfpack, which N.C. State won, 64-45.
The NCAA had assigned Danielle Jackson as the standby official for the N.C. State-Chattanooga game, but she was not used.
“There was a switch of game officials at halftime of the Chattanooga-N.C. State first-round game because it was learned after the game had started that Umpire 2 Tommi Paris had a background conflict that, if known, would prevent her from working that assigned game,” the NCAA said in a statement. “The decision was made to move Angelica Suffren, who had worked the first game of the session, into the Umpire 2 position because it provided the most on-court experience and allowed the game to maintain a full officiating crew, plus standby.”
Officials gave Chattanooga nine first-half fouls compared to three for N.C. State.
The Mocs finished with 19 personal fouls, while the Pack ended with 10. One of Chattanooga’s fourth-quarter fouls came from Suffren. She gave coach Shawn Poppie a technical foul.
Poppie said in his post-game press conference that he was notified at halftime of the change. He did not see anything, but Chattanooga’s senior woman administrator Laura Herron notified him.
“I think that’s maybe the second time now in my career that’s happened, but the other one, there was an injury, so you knew,” Poppie told reporters.
Nixon said he is not aware of any other instances when officials have been removed for a conflict of interest, but Saturday’s incident was the second in which a game official left a women’s NCAA Tournament game early. A substitute referee entered the game between Southern California and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in the second quarter after Michael Price fell onto the court and clutched the back of his thigh, the Associated Press reported. He was replaced by Demoya Pugh, the standby official.
This story was originally published March 23, 2024 at 5:26 PM with the headline "NCAA removed an official at halftime of NC State women’s tournament game. Here’s why."
