Before federal conspiracy charges of gambling on National Basketball Association games surfaced against former league referee Tim Donaghy-who plead guilty to the allegations this month-Steve Bamford monitored referees in anonymity. But in the wake of this scandal, even the Division III referees he supervises may be under the microscope as they've never been before."[Donaghy's] actions and behavior has tainted officials in all sports," Bamford said, choosing his words carefully. "He has tainted the way spectators, fans and administrators look at officials."

Bamford served as an associate officiating commissioner of the East Coast Athletic Conference for the past six years before being promoted to Associated Commissioner this summer. He is in charge of assigning, evaluating, training and hiring officials for games involving the 319 ECAC member schools.

Brandeis participates in the University Athletic Association conference, but because the UAA is not geographically configured, the league seeks out local bodies to handle its officiating. The ECAC supervises referees for east coast UAA schools like Brandeis.

Division III is a significant step down from the NBA, but the ECAC and the NCAA have several measures in place to protect the integrity of their referees. Bamford and UAA Executive Secretary Dick Rasmussen admit that the process by which Division III evaluates its officials pales in comparison to the NBA's process, which administers random background checks and features a security network that includes a representative for every team. Still, the NCAA provides pamphlets and instructional videos on the perils of gambling to all of its officials, who are primarily part-time employees. Background checks are only administered to Division I referees. "I'm not too concerned [about gambling]," Rasmussen said. "This is something the NCAA has been very proactive about."

Bamford's training process for his officials is extensive. Every one of an estimated 225 New England basketball officials must have a minimum of three to four years of high school referee experience before they can be considered for jobs, and they all must have completed a certification course for basketball referees run by Excel Sports Officiating. Prospective ECAC officials also need to complete a membership application, and, with a few exceptions, wait at least a year before being accepted. Those who are accepted try out in groups of 25 referees where they are evaluated and ranked. Bamford said only three or four are usually hired from those groups.

Bamford's main method for preventing gambling scandals is eradicating all potential conflicts of interests among officials. ECAC referees are required to sign an affiliation statement detailing relationships they have with any ECAC school. They aren't allowed to officiate one team's games more than three times in the same season, and Rasmussen has requested a provision prohibiting UAA officials from being sent to the same location two years in a row.

"[The Donaghy situation] shows why you absolutely have to eliminate all those possible conflicts of interest," Rasmussen said. "If you're the visiting coach and I'm the official, and you see me in the home coach's office before the game with my feet up, you're going to say to yourself, 'Oh my god, they've got the game in the bag tonight.'"

Once they are hired, ECAC officials undergo evaluations by supervisors, coaches and even fellow officials. The ECAC also employs trained auditors who regularly observe and meet with officials after games to discuss their performance. Officials whose accuracy is identified as being in the bottom 20 percent of the group occasionally receive visits from supervisors that report directly to Bamford.

Bamford also distributes an online coach evaluation form to coaches, encourages them to send him game tapes and allows fellow referees to rate each other. He then uses all these measures to rank his officials. Those who are highly ranked are assigned to games more frequently and receive higher-profile assignments, while the bottom ones are often demoted and replaced by new recruits, Bamford said.

Even with this review process, Rasmussen and Bamford both admit the system isn't perfect. Like most sports, basketball falls prey to human judgment in officiating. Contact naturally occurs on every possession, and the crowd can affect the officials' performance as much as it does the players'.

In a 68-64 loss at Washington University in St. Louis last season, the men's basketball team attempted 27 fewer free throws than the opposition. When the teams played again in Waltham, the Judges had a 21-18 edge in free throw attempts in an 81-75 triple-overtime victory.

Those inherent flaws in basketball officiating were amplified by the Donaghy scandal, which has made the public more suspicious of corruption in the sport.

Rasmussen, however, said he isn't worried about such problems in the UAA next season.

"At our level, I don't think [Donaghy] is going to affect much, other than some yahoo in the stands that gets upset and yells something," he said.