Longtime area football official to be honored

George Mitchell has been an official at Aiken-area football games for 34 years and will be inducted into the South Carolina Football Officials Hall of Fame. Submitted photo.

In 34 years of officiating high school football, George Mitchell has seen a few things. On Saturday, he'll be honored for that experience by being inducted in to the South Carolina Football Officials Association Hall of Fame at a ceremony in Columbia.

For 31 of those 34 years, Mitchell was a line judge, standing on the home sideline and keeping an eye on both sides of the line of scrimmage. That angle of the game is what Mitchell said he enjoyed most about the position.

"You get to see both sides of the ball; you get to see offense and defense," he said. "All the responsibility is on your side; you get to talk to the home coach."

In recent years, Mitchell said he has been concerned with the physical requirements of being a line judge, saying the potential for covering the field - goal line to goal line on a long run - might be too taxing. So for the last three years, he's taken on the greater mental responsibility of the referee position.

"It's a position that you're the man in charge; you have to know the rules," Mitchell said. "You have to know how to handle the situation, and you have to know in the spur of the moment."

He added that the referee wasn't allowed the luxury of looking up the answer or "taking a straw poll" before making a final decision, whether that involved the call itself or dealing with an upset coach. Mitchell said the keys to handling coaches who disagree with a call are to remain calm, realize that the coach may have a reason to be upset and act as a "sounding board" instead of becoming argumentative.

Based out of the Aiken office of the SCFOA, Mitchell officiates games within a 75-mile radius during the regular season, but his assignments can be anywhere in the state during the postseason.

"I've gone to Dillon before for a playoff game," he said, which is a 320-mile round trip.

Mitchell also said singling out one special game - of the roughly 430 he's officiated - is difficult.

"There's been a good many games. To try to pick out one game would be hard," he said.

Still, at least one stood out for the size of the crowd in attendance. It was a 1984 matchup between Clinton and Woodruff, coached by Keith Richardson for Clinton and Willie Varner for Woodruff.

"There were more people in the stadium than I'd ever seen before," Mitchell said.

Another set of games were remarkable as much for one player involved as for the outcome itself. Mitchell was on the crew for the 2009 Class AAAA, Division I state championship game between Dorman and Byrnes. Byrnes was the heavy favorite, but Dorman pulled off the 28-17 upset despite a notable running back carrying the football for Byrnes.

"That happened to be Marcus Lattimore's last high school game except the Shrine Bowl, and I had the Shrine Bowl, too," Mitchell said.

Lattimore is, of course, an star for the South Carolina Gamecocks now, as was another player Mitchell officiated, Dreher's Corey Jenkins. Jenkins was a first-round draft pick of the Boston Red Sox before his baseball career ended in 1999, and he ended up getting drafted by the Miami Dolphins out of USC in 2003. Mitchell has also officiated future famous Clemson Tigers, including Blackville-Hilda's Da'Quan Bowers and Aiken's own William Perry at the middle school and junior varsity levels.

With all those experiences, Mitchell said he isn't ready to end his officiating career as long as he can handle the physical requirements and pass the annual testing over rules and technique.

"I'm going to officiate as long as my health holds out," he said. "As long as I can get on the field and study and know the rules, I'm going to officiate."