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Friday, August 1, 2008
To Beijing with a Whistle
Greater Louisville, KY
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Louisville has one Olympic participant you may not have heard about: Kermit Quisenberry will officiate the men's soccer tournament.
While the world's eyes will be on the Beijing Olympics this month, one Louisville Male High School graduate will be hoping the spotlight doesn't fall on him too often.
Kermit Quisenberry, 39, will be one of six US referees officiating at the men's and women's soccer tournaments, which run from August 6-24.
Now employed at Taylor Middle High School in Pierson, Florida, Kermit was directing students out of the parking lot on April 17 when he received a call from Paul Tamberino, the national director of referees.
"He told me that I had been selected and that I was one of the six officials going to the Olympics. It was a huge surprise," he says.
Surprise, maybe, but if you talk to his peers, Kermit's rise to the top of his profession has been well earned: A journey that has been, in his own words, a "long, tough road with a few bumps."
It started at Sawyer Youth Soccer in Louisville at the age of 10 and it wasn't long before the prospect of refereeing was put to him.
"When I was 13 or 14 years old, my coach, Kent Powell, came to practice one day and said the SYSA program needed referees and they would pay our way through the clinic,” says Kermit. “All we had to do was referee one game a day on the weekends for about six weeks. I enjoyed it and it was an easy way to make money."
He then went to a United States Soccer Federation course taught by local referees Brian Darling and Bill Beatty.
"I took the two day class and literally passed out during the fitness test that was administered at the time," he says.
From then on, he refereed games when he was not playing soccer. Darling and John David McGee took him under their wing and brought him to games as their assistant referee.
"That was a great learning tool, since all the way there and all the way back we would not only talk about that game but other games as well," he said.
His move up the ladder took him to the youth regionals in Omaha, Nebraska in 1989, the Kentucky Bluegrass State Games, and Region 2 ODP regional referee camp and tournaments, and the United States Indoor Soccer League, which started in Louisville in 1993.
His big break came when he was invited to referee the first ever women’s league final in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1995. Quisenberry was next given the opportunity to referee at the youth national finals in Indianapolis.
Later, he was chosen to become an assistant referee in what was then the new Major League Soccer.
In 1997, Kermit moved to Florida to take a job as an assistant athletic trainer at Jacksonville University and became a national referee the following year.
"By meeting new people and proving that I had the ability to referee at the highest level, it opened the doors to being appointed to the international panel," he says.
In 2004, he was placed on the panel of FIFA, soccer's world governing body, and selected to officiate at the MLS cup final between DC United and Kansas City Wizards.
Since hearing the news that he is Beijing bound, Kermit and the other referees have had a hectic schedule of daily and weekly assignments.
"They have psychological assignments, technical assignments, as well as a fitness training program that we follow daily and weekly. Fitness training lasts about an hour and a half per day.
"My referee team (referee and his fellow assistant referee) have worked World Cup Qualifiers as well as MLS games together in order to get better prepared on how to act and react in different situations.”
They arrived in China on July 31, and when the 16-team men’s tournament commences on August 7—a day before the Olympic Games opening ceremony—they will have already had meetings and training sessions every day in order to prepare them for the games. Kermit knows that a good performance during the competition could see him in line to officiate at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
For budding referees from greater Louisville and southern Indiana who hope to referee on a global level, his advice is simple:
"Do as many games as you can at all levels and understand that no game is beneath you," he says. "Do not worry about your game through the tough times. Be a student of the game and watch all kinds of soccer. Sit and listen, because you never know what you will learn from other referees. There are many people out there that can teach you if you want to learn.
“You should also take each game as if it is your last, because it might be. Every time I enter the stadium, I soak it all in because I never know. You are only as good as your last whistle or flag."
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