Zacchio: Slam Dunk refs should 'let the girls play'

• There has been an average of one foul called every 56 seconds in Slam Dunk Tournament games featuring a lohud girls basketball team.
• In a regular season game between Ossining and Ursuline on Thursday, there were 59 fouls called.
• Ossining and Ursuline could meet again this Thursday, if both win Wednesday.

For the past 16 winters, girls basketball fans and women's college basketball coaches alike have made the trip  to the Westchester County Center for the annual Slam Dunk Tournament — a midseason display of the top talent in Section 1 and the other parts of the state.

Some families go to enjoy a night out with the kids, and college coaches can scout players they are recruiting while being exposed to talent that was not on their initial radar. They all go for various reasons, but none of them go to see referees stop play once every minute to call a foul.

There has been an average of one foul called every 56 seconds in each girls basketball Slam Dunk Tournament game featuring a team from the Lower Hudson Valley since 2013. The numbers over that 25-game span were collected through the official statistical records kept by the tournament.

COLUMN: ‘Tonite, Tonite’ a nod to Westchester's Arena

BASKETBALL: Schedule for and column on the 2016 Slam Dunk Tournament

COLUMN: Albertus Magnus honors, remembers coach

COLUMN: Mercy rule in girls basketball is unlikely

What should be a platform for local players to get comfortable playing on the County Center floor, which is home to the annual Section 1 championships, and raise their stock in front of collegiate scouts, the Slam Dunk Tournament has become a place where the referees — not the players — are the standouts.

The issue of "letting the girls play" is not restricted to the Slam Dunk Tournament. There were 59 fouls called in the overtime thriller between Ossining and Ursuline this past Thursday, which comes out to one foul every 36.6 seconds.

"You've got to trust your kids," Ossining head coach Dan Ricci said after the game. "I think it was a hard game to officiate because of the intensity and the environment."

THOMSON: Injuries put athletes' families in financial bind

DOUGHERTY: How some schools are letting more students play sports

Pride junior forward Helen Ishmael was one of five players to foul out of the game.

"I was a bit frustrated, and I'm sure a bunch of us were," Ishmael said after the game. "It does throw me off because I'm more of a defensive player and I'm very aggressive when it comes to defense, so I kind of have to pull back, and when I pull back, it's when I get a foul called on me.

"It's a bit difficult, but I've got to work on that."

Aside from nobody wanting to see the officials have such an effect on the game, it disrupts the flow of the competition that people — in the case of the Slam Dunk Tournament — are paying to watch.

It's one thing if it were just the Ossining-Ursuline game. It's one thing if foul calls were an issue for one Slam Dunk Tournament. But this has been three consecutive years running where there have been more fouls called than minutes played. It's unfair to the players, coaches, and fans in attendance.

Teams like Ossining, Albertus Magnus, and Irvington have made postseason trips to the County Center an almost expected occurrence, but then there are teams like Somers, which has never been to the County Center. If Monday's and Tuesday's Slam Dunk contests are the only chance Tuskers players get to play at the famed Westchester arena, they should be able to enjoy the experience, and not feel as if they were robbed of the opportunity.

Excessive foul calls help nobody. It diminishes the experience for the players and fans, and it only gives people a reason to blame officials for whatever the outcome ends up being. So, on behalf of everyone who will be at the County Center this week, I respectfully beg of the referees: "Please, let the girls play."

Twitter: @Zacchio_LoHud, @LoHudGirlsHoops