How costly were the new clock rules this season? Consider this: The rules could have contributed to Arizona State's Dirk Koetter, right, losing his job, and USC losing a shot at the national championship. An excellent piece by Chris Dufrense of the L.A. Times says the rules (3-2-5 and 3-2-5-e) are expected to be altered when the Football Rules Committee meets in February. Koetter punted late in a 28-21 loss at USC on Oct. 14, hoping to get the ball back for one last shot. But the Trojans were able to burn the remaining 1:19 off the clock, thanks in part to the new rules. USC then got torched on Dec. 2 in a 13-9 loss at UCLA. Trojan coach Pete Carroll was forced to use one of his timeouts immediately after Eric McNeal's interception with 1:10 left. Under the old rules, the clock would have stopped and Carroll could have saved a timeout for when USC got the ball back with only seconds remaining. "We had to use that timeout right then and it would have been of great value to us later in the game," Carroll said. And who could forget the fiasco on Nov. 4 at Madison? Wisconsin coach Bret Bielema purposedly ordered his team to run offside twice on kickoffs before halftime to run off the last 23 seconds, exploiting a loophole in the rules. This didn't set well with Penn State's Joe Paterno, whose team lost to Badgers, 13-3. Paterno later suffered a leg injury, adding injury to the insult.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Clock Rules Likely to Be Altered
How costly were the new clock rules this season? Consider this: The rules could have contributed to Arizona State's Dirk Koetter, right, losing his job, and USC losing a shot at the national championship. An excellent piece by Chris Dufrense of the L.A. Times says the rules (3-2-5 and 3-2-5-e) are expected to be altered when the Football Rules Committee meets in February. Koetter punted late in a 28-21 loss at USC on Oct. 14, hoping to get the ball back for one last shot. But the Trojans were able to burn the remaining 1:19 off the clock, thanks in part to the new rules. USC then got torched on Dec. 2 in a 13-9 loss at UCLA. Trojan coach Pete Carroll was forced to use one of his timeouts immediately after Eric McNeal's interception with 1:10 left. Under the old rules, the clock would have stopped and Carroll could have saved a timeout for when USC got the ball back with only seconds remaining. "We had to use that timeout right then and it would have been of great value to us later in the game," Carroll said. And who could forget the fiasco on Nov. 4 at Madison? Wisconsin coach Bret Bielema purposedly ordered his team to run offside twice on kickoffs before halftime to run off the last 23 seconds, exploiting a loophole in the rules. This didn't set well with Penn State's Joe Paterno, whose team lost to Badgers, 13-3. Paterno later suffered a leg injury, adding injury to the insult.
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2 comments:
I thought the Bielema call was brilliant. Joe Pa was fired up on that one. A couple(?) of weeks later the same oppurtunity arose and he passed on the chance to do it again.
Bieleman's call was pure horsecrap scumbaggery. He was trying to win the game by having his team avoid playing. Completely dishonorable. The refs should have (and could have) reset the clock and given Wisconsin a 15-yard penalty.
Wiz, did you go George Bush on us in the next to last sentence? Purposedly?
:)
And nice find on that L.A. Times article, thanks.
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