Chris Rastatter was a basketball standout at Rincon High School from 1978-80, an Arizona alumnus who went on to own and operate a soft pretzel food concession at the Tucson Mall and other Southern Arizona locations.
That seems like years ago. Today, Rastatter is the NCAA men's basketball National Coordinator of Officials. Translated, that means Rastatter is responsible for the 109 referees who have been chosen to work the 2026 NCAA Tournament.
NCAA coordinator of men’s basketball officiating Chris Rastatter speaks during an October news conference to introduce the Pima County Sports Hall of Fame’s 2022 induction class.
Rastatter is in his fourth year as the head of college basketball officials; before that, he was assigned to work 19 consecutive NCAA Tournaments, including the 2021 Final Four. He started out as a rec league referee at the Lakeside Sportsclub on Tucson's east side. He then advanced to high school and junior college officiating before the Pac-12 hired him in 1995.
Rastatter has been evaluating more than 400 referees all season, coast to coast. Last week, he flew to NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis and gave the NCAA men's basketball committee a list of 109 officials to work the Big Dance. He will be out of town until after the national championship game, evaluating referees in New York and Atlanta, and in a command center at the TNT studios in Atlanta, watching every game with eight other referee evaluators.
People are also reading…
Officials will advance week to week in the NCAA, determined by Rastatter's evaluations.
According to Kenpom.com, the five top officials in the country this season are Doug Sirmons (who has worked nine Arizona games this year), Kipp Kissinger (nine UA games), Ron Grover (1 UA game), Marques Pettigrew (four UA games) and Keith Kimble (no UA games). The ref that UA fans love to hate, Tony Padilla, is ranked No. 12. He called four UA games this season.
4 things to know about Arizona men's basketball's March Madness history
