Referees
What is the definition of a referee in basketball?
What are the duties of a referee?
Who is a referee assisted by?
A referee or simply ref is the person of authority who is responsible for presiding over the game from a neutral point of view and making on-the-fly decisions that enforce the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The official tasked with this job may be known, in addition to referee, by a variety of other titles as well (often depending on the sport), including official, umpire, judge, arbiter, arbitrator, linesman, commissaire, timekeeper, touch judge or Technical Official (by the International Olympic Committee).
In international basketball and in college basketball, the referee is the lead official in a game, and is assisted by either one or two umpires. In the National Basketball Association, the lead official is referred to by the term crew chief and the two other officials are referees. All of the officials in a basketball game are generally accepted to have the same authority as the lead official and therefore they are collectively known as the officials or referees.