Well, a lot has happened since the last time I had anything to say here. We re-questioned Monte after a barn burner vs. Arizona; won a recruiting battle against the “guy who has our number” in front of a sea of cardinal and gold in some random baseball stadium by the bay; took the domers out back to the woodshed, glittery helmets and all[1]; then we lost in triple OT to “future #1 overall draft pick Andrew Luck”[2] in a game that had equal chances becoming a blowout or a nail-biting win in either direction on any one of a multitude of plays. Since everyone already saw the game[3], here are a handful of those plays:
1. Pullard’s missed tackle on the furd’s first drive which turned 3 into 7.
2. Woods doing human things with a sure TD on our first drive turning 7 into punt.
3. One of the worst non-called PI’s in the history of non-called PI’s on what should have been Woods’ second TD of the day turning 7 into 3.[4]
4. Woods doing more human things with a muffed KOR attempt after the furd made it 10-3.[5]
5. Barkley missing Lee by “this much” after he got behind the coverage and into the end zone.[6]
6. The furd’s FG attempt that was good by maybe 2 inches.
7. TJ’s flag.[7]
8. A completely missed holding non-call on Graf which set up..
9. The great :01 debate.[10] To be fair, none of this comes up if Woods doesn’t do even more human things and just drops or dives forward instead of running those 3-4 additional seconds off the clock. We had 2 timeouts at that point, and if Woods just picks up a few and lunges forward, we probably have 2ish seconds to attempt a game winning 53ish yard field goal. I agree that a 53ish yard field goal to win the game in front of 93,000 and a national audience against a top-5 team by a freshman kicker is slim at best, but the fact that we are even arguing about not getting the opportunity to try is a testament to how far we’ve come.[11]
Some have asked about the play call there. My response: Coming into the year, our o-line was patchwork at best. Our run game has been inconsistent all year[13] so Kiffin has used some sort of quick-out screen to Woods as our de facto I-formation ISO play. One of the more underrated aspects of this SC team is the WR blocking – they all do it exceptionally well. All that to say, I didn’t mind the screen play to Woods in the middle of the field knowing we needed 5-10 yards and had 2 timeouts.
10. A 2-yard holding penalty.[14] There is no legitimate explanation for 2nd and 5 with holding at or near the LOS becoming 2nd and 7. It’s a 10 yard spot foul, as in “from the spot of the foul”. In other words, it should have been at least 2nd and 14. You think that’s not a big deal when the next play goes for 9 yards? 3rd and 5 is completely different than 1st and 10 at the SC 13.
11. The furd’s PAT attempt that was blocked by the kicker’s foot.[15]
12. Tre’s arm being half an inch too short on “future #1 overall draft pick Andrew Luck’s” TD pass in the third OT.
13. Lee being an inch long this time and stepping out of bounds on his almost-TD catch and run in the third OT.[16]
All this means is that maybe it’s time to fully jump on the Lane-train. The more I see of the guy, the more I find to like. He a good game-planner and play-caller, seems to be developing the players on his offense, and can recruit / evaluate talent as well or better than anyone else in the nation. Plus, he has ten thousand new reasons for his players (and future players) to believe that he has their backs and will fight for them.[17] The team is young. We’ll be fine, and we’re oozing promise and potential. I’m proud of this team. It’s a short week – heal up, practice hard, and get ready for Colorado. Fight on.
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3 Coli sellout + ESPIN Gameday. So far they’re 2 for 2 during the sanction years. They can’t quit us. [jump]
4 Picture from USCFootball.com.
6 *this* much. That’s a very possible 21-6 SC at the half if anyone’s counting and the counterpoint to footnote #5. [jump]
7 Hit in question. Now I get the need to protect football players. It’s a violent sport that is being played faster and harder than it ever has, and we really might be closer than anyone is comfortable being to having a player die on the field. That doesn’t mean we need to overreact. The rule states that it is illegal to lead with the head or hit an opposing player in the head. The rule also states that it is illegal to target a “defenseless receiver” where the ball is no longer catchable.
TJ clearly did not lead with his head. In fact, he led with what is pretty much the only body part you can lead with – his shoulder. He didn’t even hit Owusu in the head. He hit him a bit high in the chest, but of course, this was only after Owusu’s legs went out and he dropped a few inches. TJ was already airborne by then which means he was basically flagged for not being able to change directions midair after leaving his feet at full speed – even though the hit could be argued legal. Can you name any creature or species on this planet that can? As for the defenseless part, had Owusu caught that ball, TJ would have been praised for making a great play by putting his shoulder on the ball (which would have been in Owusu’s midsection) and maybe breaking up the completion in the process – Taylor Mays, anyone?
Be serious, there was no way TJ knew or could have known that Owusu wasn’t going to catch that ball before he was already in the air. Now for anyone who still believes SC is “just a bunch of dirty players”, turn on one quarter of next weekend’s Bama vs. LSU game. There might be more hits like TJ’s in one quarter alone (unflagged, and praised, of course) than the pac-12 allows all season. For this single reason alone, the pac-12 will never be respected by anyone outside of Walnut Creek.[8]
Now there’s news Scott suspended TJ for the first half of the Colorado game.[9] Seriously? There are no printable words I have to describe what I think about this. I argued against the flag in the paragraph above, but I know that the flag was nothing out of the norm from pac-12 refs. It’s something I just have to live with as it is how they have decided to interpret the rule. However, a suspension coming the same day TJ was named a Thorpe Award Semifinalist (an award for the nation’s top DB) goes to show that someone clearly isn’t seeing things right. [jump]
9 I did it again. Ridiculousness out of Walnut Creek. [jump]
10 :01 footage. The “NCAA Football Instant Replay Bulletin #1” from September 15, 2009, states:
Difficulties may arise when the game clock is not stopped either by the ruling on the field or the result of the replay review. In such cases there is no clear path to determining what the reading on the clock should be when play is resumed following a review resulting in a reversal…
If time remains on the game clock:
There is no timing adjustment and the game clock is started on the referee’s signal.
If time on the game clock expires during the play:
In the first or third quarter:
The game moves to the second or fourth quarter. The game clock starts on the snap.
In the second or fourth quarter:
(a) If Team A has no timeouts available, the half or game is completed.
(b) If Team A has a timeout available, it may elect to use one and the clock will be adjusted to its reading at the time the runner should have been ruled down. If Team A elects not to use a timeout, the half or game is completed.
Now, on the field, the play was ruled out of bounds with the time expired – from instant replay we could argue that there was some fraction of :01 left on the clock when the play was ruled out of bounds, but we all know that in football, the clock doesn’t stop until the ref signals it to. I would understand that logic.
However, after replay, the refs decided that the play was ruled down when Woods’ knee touched in bounds which definitely happened with at least :01 left on the clock. Now under normal circumstances (non-reviewed), the clock would probably just run out before a ref would have the chance to grant Kiffin a timeout, but since it was a review, the above NCAA ruling states that Kiffin should have been given that chance to take one of his two remaining timeouts. This would have allowed us to attempt our 47ish yard game winning field goal (Heidari already made one from 50 earlier in the game). [jump]
However, after replay, the refs decided that the play was ruled down when Woods’ knee touched in bounds which definitely happened with at least :01 left on the clock. Now under normal circumstances (non-reviewed), the clock would probably just run out before a ref would have the chance to grant Kiffin a timeout, but since it was a review, the above NCAA ruling states that Kiffin should have been given that chance to take one of his two remaining timeouts. This would have allowed us to attempt our 47ish yard game winning field goal (Heidari already made one from 50 earlier in the game). [jump]
11 I was deathly afraid of even making it to the crossbar on 33+ yarders last year, and I remember one bouncing on the “S” in the endzone on a 40ish yarder.
I also need to say that Woods doing human things in this game is understandable after missing all week of practice due to the fact that we like putting him in situations to get hit by linebackers with a full head of steam 7-10 more times a game than is probably necessary (and the fact that he’s 185 soaking wet, in his pads and cleats). However, I understand the coaches putting him in these situations (KOR, bubble screens, swing passes out of the backfield). He might be the toughest player on our team, and he's our biggest playmaker. He’s an all-world blocker (no “from the WR position” designation necessary[12]), shoe-in all-American, future 1st round draft pick, and might go down as my favorite SC WR of all time. He verbally committed to us the day after Pete left and knew full well some sort of sanctions were coming. He’s the quintessential Trojan. So I don’t want to confuse anyone. Saying Woods did human things is completely meant jokingly. [jump]
15 Seriously, it looked like it was blocked the moment it left his foot – wobbly like a duck. [jump]
17 These 10,000 reasons are the exact opposite of what Brian Kelly did last week. I just wish Haden had our backs:
"I'm sure Stanford has its own list of plays it's upset with," Haden said. "It never does any coach any good to publicly complain about the officials. It should be done privately."
More than that, Haden said, "It's part of the game; live with it."
I had a feeling listening to Haden he had already said as much to Kiffin.
"I think we have a fine coach," Haden said. "We talked and he agrees; we're finished talking about officials."
The above was pulled from an LA Times article. I refuse to link it because I don’t want Simers to get the click-traffic (since I’m sure both of you still reading are paying enough attention to care to click a link by the 17th footnote). I should also add that it never does any AD any good to publicly complain about the coach. It should be done privately. [jump]
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