PHILADELPHIA - The allegations against former NBA referee Tim Donaghy - that he bet on games, including some he officiated - highlight a question: Can a referee affect the outcome of a game?

In a sampling from both the officiating and sports-betting community, the answer was a resounding yes.

Even though there are three officials on the court, two local high school referees, both of whom requested anonymity, and R.J. Bell, the founder of the betting Web site Pregame.com, said one person could indeed alter a game.

It’s not only local officials who don’t want to speak on the record. An NBA official and a college referee said yesterday that they had been prohibited from discussing the issue in any manner. Even a number of high school officials declined to speak.

The high school referees who did speak said the easiest way to affect a game was to take a star player out by calling fouls.

"You give the top player two quick early fouls, and he has to sit down a considerable amount of time," one official said.

Both officials said there was an even easier way to have the player exit.

"You can get rid of the player by giving him two technical fouls," both referees said.

The referees said it didn’t always take much to get under a player’s skin.

But even if an official is trying to alter just the point spread and not the outcome, the plan can backfire.

"Say a team that is favored by 10 and is up by 12, and then the ref makes some calls that get it down to six," Bell said. "Then that underdog team could get hot and win the game, so it can affect the result."

Bell has published data that say the first 15 games of the 2006-07 season that were officiated by Donaghy and that had enough betting to move the point spread at least 1.5 points were perfect against the Las Vegas spread. That means the big-money gamblers won 15 of 15 times.

"The odds of that happening are 32,768-1," Bell said yesterday in a telephone interview. "Typically, the money that moves the line wins only 50 percent of the time."

And it’s not always the calls the official makes that can affect a game.

"If a player who is a 90 percent foul shooter is hit driving to the basket and an official doesn’t make the call, then you are keeping him off the foul line," one of the officials said. "That’s two potential foul shots that he can make that he isn’t going to attempt."

Referees of all sports will now come under more scrutiny, said Larry White, an assistant director of the New Jersey Interscholastic Athletic Association, who is the liaison to the state’s officials in all sports.

White is a former minor-league umpire who reached the Triple-A level and a former high school basketball official.

"Every official in every sport on all levels will come into question because the American public is pretty cynical," White said.

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