IFAF Rules Committee

IFAF Rules Committee

 

Jim's jottings (2024-10-16)

16th October 2024

There has been some attention this week about a play with 10 seconds remaining in last weekend's Ohio State v Oregon college football game. Oregon put 12 players on defense to ensure that Ohio State did not make a big gain that might have put them in field goal range to win the game. Their Head Coach admitted that the 12th player had been intentional.

The substitution foul stopped the clock and Ohio State were given the advantage of a 5-yard penalty, but more crucially for the game, the play with the foul took up 4 valuable seconds. Ohio State only had time to run one more play, and from beyond field goal range.

NCAA has addressed this by issuing a bulletin. The bulletin says that, in future, if a similar scenario with 12 players on the field occurs after the two-minute timeout, the offended team should be given the option to reset the game clock back to the time it was at the snap.

In my view, NCAA did not go far enough. Putting 12 players on the field is only one of a number of ways that Team B could intentionally foul in order to prevent a Team A advance, while consuming time: deliberately being offside could be another. There is also one scenario already specified in the rules, in Approved Ruling 9-2-3:II. That says:

"Team A, trailing by nine points, has 1st-and-10 on the B-22 with 0:35 showing on the game clock. At the snap, B21, B40 and B44 blatantly hold, wrapping both arms around Team A's wideouts and take them to the ground. Quarterback A12 has no receiver in the route, scrambles and then legally throws the ball away. After the play, the game clock reads 0:26. The back judge, field judge and side judge have a flag down for Team B holding on each of their keys. RULING: This is a blatant and obvious unfair act designed to take time off the clock. The referee will convert the holding fouls to unsportsmanlike conduct fouls. Penalise half the distance to the goal. Team A will have 1st and 10 at the B-11. The game clock is reset to 0:35 and starts on the next snap. B21, B40 and B44 each have one unsportsmanlike foul counter."

The general principle therefore is that any time the referee suspects that a team has intentionally fouled to create a clock (or other) advantage, Rule 9-2-3-c should be invoked to restore time to the game clock, and also to penalise the offending team appropriately - typically a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty even if the foul normally only carries 5 or 10 yards.

Of course, that relies on the officials being sufficiently aware of what is going on to spot the reason for the foul. Experienced officials are more likely to spot this sort of tactic, but anyone with a sense for the tactical state of the game might "smell a rat". This would be a reason for the officials to confer, share what information they might have (which might include overhead conversations in the team area) and respond appropriately.

It should never be possible for a team to gain an advantage by intentionally committing a foul. The rules to deal with it already exist. Officials should not be afraid to enforce them.

Prof Jim Briggs

Chair, IFAF Rules Committee
Editor, Manual of Football Officiating