As the game clock counted down that cold Dec. 9, 2006, night at Jackson Memorial Stadium in Mississippi, so was football official Sarah Thomas’ high school career. “I told my husband, ‘You know what, I’ve gone as far as I’m going to go.’” Or so she thought.
Officiating had been a fulfilling little side job during the previous 11 years, but her two growing boys weren’t getting any younger. And that maternal call was tugging at her consciousness more than ever to stop sacrificing those precious autumn nights that she could never have back with her family.
The then 33-year-old pharmaceutical sales representative was determined to make time for sons Bridley and Brady just as her beloved father, Spencer Bailey, always used to make time for Daddy’s little girl.
Her Father’s Influence
From helping him change the oil on “The Banana,” their yellow 1978 Ford LTD Crown Victoria, to firing up shots in the confines of the Pascagoula (Miss.) High School gymnasium or crying into the phone during a trying college experience, Sarah shared a bond with her father, the depth of which has only been enhanced with the passing of time.
“I just remember him telling me very early on,” Thomas said, “‘Don’t depend on a man or anyone else to help you get through.’ I just went through life knowing I couldn’t make excuses. If I got the opportunity, I was the one who had to perform, I was the one who had to show myself. I couldn’t blame it on somebody else.”
And that’s just how Spencer and Donna Bailey’s only daughter, born between sons Spencer Lea and Scott, conducted herself during her officiating career. That’s just how she performed as a line judge during her swan song in that Division 4A state championship game between perennial power Wayne County and Clarksdale. With accountability and a cool, controlling presence.
The Call That Changed Everything
Little could she have realized that a routine motion penalty she called in the second quarter, which triggered embarrassing onfield confusion, would change the course of her life. And that her final high school game would actually serve as a launching pad for this young mother and wife to be sent rapidly through the ranks on a history-making trajectory.
Less than nine months later, on Sept. 15, 2007, she became the first woman to officiate an NCAA Division I-A game, when she served as line judge for a game between Memphis and Jacksonville State. Thomas performed with the presence of a veteran that day, not as a nervous novice struggling to survive in this most macho of sports. And she would do the same with one other assignment as an alternate in 2007 and five more D-I games on a split crew during the 2008 season.
“I thought Sarah was outstanding in the game,” Memphis Coach Tommy West said. “The big thing is she tried to be as inconspicuous as she could. She didn’t want to make a scene. She just wanted to be a good referee.
“I thought she was really good in calling the game. Officials do a good job if you don’t notice they are on the field. They manage the game and you don’t notice that they are there. And I thought that’s what she did.”
That trajectory took her to even more historic heights July 31, 2008, when the 5-foot-11 Thomas’ lanky presence could be found on the fields of Milsaps College in Jackson, Miss., where she served as an official during a New Orleans Saints scrimmage. That’s right. We’re talking NFL. She’s come a long way, baby, and Thomas just might not stop until she crashes through what had long been conceded to be an impenetrable barrier — women as working professionals on the fields of the NFL who are not attired in revealing cheerleader outfits.
Does Thomas belong? You’d better believe she does.
“Let’s take her gender out of it,” said Gerald Austin, football officiating coordinator of Conference USA, who retired at the end of last season after a 26-year career as an NFL official. “She is an excellent candidate for the NFL.”
Will Thomas eventually succeed? Why not?
“Mechanically, she’s as sound as anyone,” said Larry Thomas (no relation to Sarah), associate director and supervisor of officials for the Mississippi High School Activities Association (MHSAA). “And, of course, it’s her judgment, too, which is why she’s been able to advance where she is. She does it the right way, so why not?”
So how in the good name of Art McNally could this remarkable success story possibly have unfolded? Let’s revisit that one play at Jackson Memorial Stadium, a play that elevated Thomas from a soon-to-be retired high school football official to a rising young star.
“I had a wide receiver go in motion toward the line of scrimmage and, in high school, that’s illegal motion,” Sarah Thomas said. “So I threw my flag and they threw a pass and got a first down.
“Well, when they got the first down, I came in blowing my whistle, but the chains moved, which is a no-no. When there’s a flag on the ground, you don’t want your chains to move and they were across the field from me. When I noticed they had moved, I immediately turned to my auxiliary down box guy and said, ‘You’re at the line of scrimmage?’ and he said, ‘Yes, I haven’t moved’ because he saw my flag and I said, ‘Great, we’re just going to back ‘em up five from here and it’s going to be second and 15.’
“So I go in and I tell my white hat what we have and, for some reason, they reset the chains and they went second and 10. So I went back in and I said, ‘No, it’s five yards from the previous spot. It’s going to be second and 15.’ They said, ‘OK, Sarah.’
“So I turn around, go back to my position and I look up and now it’s first and 10. So I go back in and I said, ‘Guys, we really need to get this together’ and, eventually, we got it right.”
A Discovery in the Press Box
As Thomas cleaned up that mess with the cool-headed presence that has so defined her as an official, Dr. Joe Haynes was watching from up in the darkness in an unheated pressbox, bundled in a coat, hat and gloves. It was a simple twist of fate that brought this former Southeast Conference and NFL official to Jackson Memorial Stadium that night since Haynes was not specifically assigned to scout there.
“I just made that decision myself to look at this game,” he said.
It could prove to be one of the most productive scouting trips of his career.
“I was sitting next to another person and I said, ‘You know, that was a good, good, good correction on the part of the official on this side,” Haynes said. “And he said, ‘You know, that’s a lady.’ I put my field glasses on the person and realized it was a lady. At that point, I realized here’s a person who really understands the game.
“Sarah was the person who made sure that it was the correct down and distance. It was several times that she had to report this and that got my attention. There are a lot of good officials out there, but what you look for are those things that make people stand out and I could tell from a distance that she was really making sure that this crew understood what this situation was.
“This was a totally unexpected discovery. I didn’t go there looking for Sarah Thomas. I didn’t know if she was male or female. But I saw she had good mechanics. And I started watching her really close then.”
Unbeknownst to Thomas, on the same night she thought she was retiring from a career, the wheels were being set in motion that could take her to historic heights.
“Joe called me,” Austin recalled, “and said, ‘We’ve got an official here in Mississippi that you need to look at.’ When Joe has guided me to other officials, he’s been very astute in his observations about officials — who can officiate and who can’t. I said, ‘OK, what’s his name?’ And he said, ‘His name is Sarah Thomas. And I’m telling you, she can officiate and you need to take a look at her.’
“So I called Sarah and talked to her and she signed up for the Reno Officiating Camp. I was an instructor at the camp and I saw 12 officials at each position for three days and I thought she was the best person at her position.”
Poise Under Pressure
But then, Sarah Thomas just has a way of distinguishing herself with a cool, level-headed presence. We take you back to Aug. 14, 1990, when she was still a growing Sarah Bailey, a star softball pitcher. Five weeks prior to her 17th birthday, she was pitching for the Pascagoula All-Stars against West Jefferson of New Orleans in the Dixie Youth Girls World Series at Wilgits Field in West Monroe, La.
Thomas was trying to escape a tense moment in a game Pascagoula eventually won, 5-4. She threw a gorgeous changeup that appeared to be such an obvious strike that the West Jefferson hitter started walking back to the dugout.
But the umpire saw it differently, called it a ball and Bailey reacted with the composure that would one day define her as a football official. Instead of a frustration-fueled outburst, an expression-less Bailey momentarily sank to her knees on the pitching rubber in disbelief before continuing. She wasn’t showing up the umpire. Instead, Bailey was composing herself to dig deeper until she could somehow get the job done.
“I seriously remember thinking to myself, ‘What in the world is he looking for?’” Thomas said. “I just pitched a ball on a silver platter and caught the hitter off guard with a beautiful changeup for strike three that he didn’t call! Did I catch him off guard, too?
“I literally fell to my knees. But I knew we were running out of pitching and I had to somehow put the ball where he wanted. So I told myself, ‘Here we go. I’ve got to find a way to make him call strikes.’
“After the game, the three umps came up to me, with the home plate umpire stating that I did great and that he never had a pitcher start and finish an entire game with him behind the plate. I could certainly see why!”
That was Daddy’s little girl.
“I’ve seen her show disappointment, but I’ve never seen her lose control,” Spencer Bailey said.
More than 18 years later, Thomas can see that incident as a precursor that makes her such an up-and-coming official.
“It’s in the heat of the moment when you keep your composure and stay focused on what you are supposed to be doing,” she said. “My mom always said when I was under pressure, I would perform better. On the mound, if I would’ve broken down and let the official’s small strike zone consume me, I would’ve failed.
“However, knowing I had to stay in control because my teammates were depending on me kept me focused on finding that strike zone. Just like with the football crew, we depend on each other. If I don’t stay focused, poised and confident or if I start to look for something, I will let them down.”
Family, Faith and Finishing What You Start
It all started with her parents. Thomas refers to her mother as her best friend. She refers to her father as the greatest influence in her life. Together, Spencer and Donna Bailey raised their three children in a Christian home with strong values, tough love, an unrelenting belief in their potential and one rule.
“Once we started something, whatever that might be, we could never quit,” Thomas said. “No matter how tough we thought it was at the time, we had to finish what we started. They instilled in me a very strong mind-set that when a challenge presents itself, I use it as an opportunity to accomplish success.”
Just as that explains how Thomas would one day take on the enormous challenge of scaling the heights of officiating to perhaps an historic height, it also explains how she was able to earn a full basketball scholarship to the University of Mobile and took on the challenge of being a 5-11 center at the major-college level when both of the team’s centers became pregnant.
She was a junior on that 1993-94 Mobile team that went 15-16 one season after the Lady Rams went 22-9 and won the NAIA District 30 championship. It wasn’t fun anymore and she didn’t know if she wanted to carry on.
“The team seemed divided,” she said. “It didn’t ever seem like there was a unity and do you know what? We weren’t winning. We broke even that year. There was a lot of controversy going on. Both of our centers got pregnant. I’m 5-11 and I’m playing center in college basketball, which is just unheard of.
“That was the moment I called my parents.”
Thomas knew what her father was going to tell her before she placed that call. And she ended up sticking out that trying season and returning for her senior season, when she earned a Gulf Coast Athletic Conference Scholar-Athlete award and helped the Lady Rams to a 24-8 record and second place in the conference.
“I always told her to dwell on the positive instead of the negative,” Spencer Bailey said. “You know, like, ‘Poor old me. It’s not fair.’ I always told her, ‘We don’t want to go there.’”
Always Finding Answers
In retrospect, that anguished cry home to her parents represented an insolated incident in her life. This is young woman who always had her act together. And the time would come when she would be the one taking charge during a telephone call to her parents.
It was after Hurricane Katrina cut its devastating path though Pascagoula in September 2005. Spencer and Donna Bailey were trapped in their house with dwindling supplies. And Thomas was in New York for an Upwards Ministries Basketball Camp mission trip, which was giving a clinic to inner city kids.
Cell-phone service to the hurricane-ravaged south was sporadic because of the devastation and Thomas waited for three days to hear from her father. On a Thursday, three days after she had last spoke to him, his number showed up on her cell phone as she anxiously waited in her New York hotel room.
“He had a frantic tone in his voice and I could tell he was in need,” Thomas said. “He said, ‘We need water and gas! Do you hear me? As much gas as we can get!’ See, they had a generator and my mom is a breast cancer survivor who has lymphodema. It’s not good for her to get too hot and the generator kept the ceiling fans going.”
From New York, Thomas called her husband, Brian, and the two compiled a list of necessities.
“I told him he had to get to my parents today somehow,” she said. “He managed to get 25 gallons of gas, water, batteries and food. When Brian pulled up in our Suburban with the back down, my daddy started crying.”
Vintage Thomas it was. Always in control. Always finding answers, sometimes under intense pressure. No wonder this woman appears to be on the fast track to one day taking her abilities all the way to NFL stadiums.
The Road Ahead
And if that day comes, Thomas will carry on as if she belongs. Just as she did during the Saints’ scrimmage.
“What a great experience,” she said. “There was a great piece of advice NFL referee Gene Steratore gave me. He told me that no matter what level of officiating you are doing, you have to make the game slow down. And I have tried to apply that each time I hit the field.”
For someone who thought her career was winding down just two years ago, it could be the start of something historic. Just how badly does Thomas want to succeed, especially after the emotional conflict of being away from her husband and two sons so many nights?
Just as you would expect Spencer Bailey’s daughter to feel. A challenge has presented itself. Bring it on.
“I would be lying if I didn’t say I would love to work in the NFL,” she said. “It’s what every official would love to do. It’s where the best officials are working.”
She also is determined to not let her family down. Family concerns were what originally convinced Thomas to back away from officiating, but she just knows she can make this work. In fact, it already has been working.
“I think the boys actually enjoy having the house to themselves on the weekends, but they do welcome me back with hugs and kisses on Sundays,” she said. “I am so glad I have continued with my career. I could not imagine not officiating in the fall. Nor do I think my boys could. Honestly, they attend more of my games now than they did before.
“And I have a wonderful husband who reassures me that I’m doing the right thing and to never doubt it. And with a man like him, who loves me unconditionally and is a great father, I really know I have nothing to worry about when I leave on Fridays. As I reflect on all of this, honestly, it’s gotten easier emotionally.”
That’s just how Brian Thomas wants his wife to feel.
“Sarah goes above and beyond to keep the lives of me and the boys as normal as possible,” he said. “She is an extraordinary person and we are so proud of her. The coolest part of the weekend is whenever the game she is officiating is on television. The boys and their friends are glued to the TV watching the game.”
Sarah Thomas will take it from there. Just as she always has.
Peter Jackel is a longtime sportswriter from Racine, Wis.
