“Be the Referee” is back for 2021-22 with MHSAA assistant director Brent Rice explaining how rules have reverted or been modified due to last year’s COVID-19 adjustments.

Be The Referee is a series of short messages designed to help educate people on the rules of different sports, to help them better understand the art of officiating, and to recruit officials.

Below is this week's segment – Protocols and Mechanics – Listen

Other than a few select instances, all MHSAA protocols, procedures and playing rules have returned to what they were pre-COVID.

This means that football team boxes will return to the area between the 25-yard lines, traditional ball-handling and other officials mechanics will return in all sports and postgame handshakes will be permitted as each school sees fit.

Additionally, there will be some rules modifications that were adopted during the pandemic that will likely be kept as part of the normal playing rules moving forward. The one that stands out for this upcoming fall season is that in volleyball, teams will not switch benches or sides of the net unless the referee determines that a team is at a disadvantage due to the layout of the facilities and obstructions.