An official was pulled at halftime of Saturday’s NC State-Chattanooga first-round women’s NCAA Tournament game, a change that typically only happens if an official is injured during the course of the game. Regarding the change, the NCAA gave reporters on site a statement that read in part: “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.
In this situation, both the NCAA should’ve made sure she was not assigned to this game and Paris should’ve disclosed her own personal conflict. First-round officiating assignments were delivered to officials last weekend. It’s unclear why neither the NCAA knew this information nor why Paris wouldn’t have brought up the conflict of interest. Making the matter even murkier is that Paris officiated the regular season -Chattanooga game on Dec. 2, according to the game’s box score.