Father/sons hold court
Derek Linn’s basketball officiating “career” got off to an inauspicious start. Linn was 14 years old, tagging along with his father, Bob, who was working a basketball camp.
The camp was short on officials. At his father’s urging, Derek put on the stripes, grabbed a whistle, and worked the camp as an official for the first time.
Derek, 30, has continued to follow his father’s footsteps and once or twice a season, officiating is a family affair. Last week, Derek joined his father, Bob, and older brother, Ryan (40), on the court at Riverside HS to work a boys basketball game. It was not the prettiest game (there were 39 personal fouls and one technical foul called), but for Bob Linn, the games he works with his sons are his favorite part of the season.
“There’s a lot of pride,” Bob said. “Any parent wants their kids to be more successful than they are, and Derek and Ryan are both better than I am. But we get a lot of compliments when we work together. Last year at Southmont there was a coach who had coached his sons and wanted to get a picture with us. Coaches a lot of times will say something to us so it’s a pretty neat deal for me.”
The Linns, who are all Southmont HS graduates, worked a game last February that was supposed to be Bob’s swan song. But it was such a fun game he decided he did not want to give it up. In fact, the 61-year-old is now planning to go nine more years to make it 50 years since he started refereeing intramural games as an undergraduate at Purdue in 1980-81.*