Steve Matarante Feature

[agpennypacker]

Rutgers published an alumni piece on Steve Matarante, reporting that he worked for the Big Ten from 2013-2017 and then transitioned to the ACC. But they have him working the 2021 Ohio State-Rutgers game. I'm a little confused. Which conference is he working for these days? And do conferences allow officials to work games involving their alma mater? I'm sure he did a great job and called an unbiased game, but that factoid surprised me a little.


www.rutgers.edu/news/intramural-sports-ncaa-football-referee-alum-scores-dream-career?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=rutgerstoday&utm_content=Student%20Success

[russ]

Matarante is currently working for the ACC, he actually worked the National Championship last year as the LJ. The article was correct he was with the Big Ten from 2013 to 2017 and with the Big East before that. When Rutgers and Maryland came over the Big Ten took a few Officials from the Big East most notably Jerry McGinn and Matarante and then current NFL LJ Dan Gallagher a few years later. College Officials are not allowed to work their alma matter and he is currently an ACC Official so that factoid about him working Ohio State-Rutgers is wrong. That picture at the top of the article is definitely not him, he is a lot older than that Official.

[agpennypacker]

Thanks for clarifying, Russ. I can’t believe the writer got that so unbelievably wrong, right down to the photo. Wow. It certainly did not make sense to me that an ACC official would randomly work a Big Ten game involving his alma mater LOL

[andrewmccarthy]

He worked Ohio State at Rutgers in 2015 when he was in the Big Ten. The photo is from that game. Somehow they got the date of that game wrong a couple times.