SEC, PAC-10 Make Rare Move In Suspending Officials

NEW YORK (AP) - Against the backdrop of the Southeastern Conference and Pac-10 suspending officials who made high-profile mistakes, the national coordinator of college officials says he generally dislikes such public discipline.

But David Parry also understands the pressure that bad calls can create.

"There are circumstances where sometimes the conference is backed into a corner and the best way to put out the fire is to publicly acknowledge they took steps to discipline an official," Parry said Tuesday in a phone interview.

Last week, a Southeastern Conference officiating crew was suspended after it called penalties the league said were not supported by video evidence in the LSU-Georgia game on Oct. 3 and the Arkansas-Florida game on Oct. 17.

On Tuesday, the Pac-10 announced it suspended a game official for missing a facemask penalty in the Oregon State-Southern California game last weekend.

In both cases, the names of the officials were not released by the conferences. But officials' names are generally provided to the media covering games.

Officials are evaluated by their conferences every week and it is not uncommon for them to be penalized for poor performances, Parry said. But usually the punishment is doled out behind close doors and not announced to the media.

"They are held accountable," said Parry, who was Big Ten coordinator of football officials for 19 years before being hired by the NCAA as the first national coordinator in 2007.

Postseason assignments are largely based on how officials grade-out during the regular season. The officials with the best grades get the best assignments - such as BCS games - and the worst might not work any postseason games.