Washington Huskies screwed by officials

[George S. Patton]

Anybody see the unsportsmanlike conduct penalty by the officials on the Washington QB after he scored the TD at the end of the game? Huskies had to attempt a 35-yd PAT and it was blocked. BYU won, 28-27.

If you blinked, you missed the "celebration". I know officials are going to enforce that more this year but use a little judgment here.

[peruna81]

Washington's QB said in postgame interview that he realized after the fact that he violated the rule. He 'manned-up' and took responsibility for the mistake. UW should have blocked and kicked the PAT, no excuses.

Real interesting note was the 'celebration' after the PAT was blocked by BYU. No call. Kids fly off the bench. IIRC there were .02 seconds left on the game clock.

Interesting time to enforce the rule to that extent.

[RednBlue11]

shame on them for even allowing the officials the possibility of giving them the penalty

[CA Mustang]

UW should have blocked and kicked the PAT, no excuses..

That kick was way too low.

Real interesting note was the 'celebration' after the PAT was blocked by BYU. No call. Kids fly off the bench. IIRC there were .02 seconds left on the game clock.

BYU was called for a celebration penalty, however since it was a dead ball foul it was assessed on the kickoff.

[KnuckleStang]

While Excessive Celebration is probably my favorite penalty in sports, I do feel they need to use a little more common sense these days. Worst case I saw was a couple weeks ago when the South Carolina receiver did 15 pushups on the field (self punishment) for dropping a pass that hit his chest and got flagged for it, as if he were somehow "celebrating" the dropped pass. Craig James agreed with the official, but I (and Chris Fowler) thought it was BS.

[smudad]

I hate the celebrations ("look at me!") as much as anyone. But, I think my real quarrel is with the upbringing of the players involved, along with our culture. And, I know the people from the generation that created these narcissistic poops (the referees' generation - my own as well) don't have the discernment required to enforce such a rule.

If I had my real 'druthers', the team would not be penalized at all. (They've already been punished enough having to live with an ego-centric jerk.) Rather, the offending player would have to go out under the stands with a contingent of real players of days gone by (Butkus, Huff, George, Golic, Wright, White, et al) and get the living crap kicked out of him for his exhibition that said 'I don't give a rip about the team and have little or no discipline of my own.' But, that's just me - an old fahrt.

BTW, you could apply this rule to NCAA Death Penalty violations - players and donors alike - as well.

[PoconoPony]

I understand the rule and believe common sense should prevail when a situation is on the bubble. In this case it was probably best to hold the flag and subjectively look at the situation and intent recognizing that neither were within the intent of the rule. Bottom line is that the penalty really should have had NO effect on the extra point. It is still a chip shot that should be made 99% of the time. Attention should be directed exactly at the O line for failure to block and execute the PAT. The penalty is superfluous to the situation and should not even be a matter of issue let alone special unnecessary commentary on ESPN.

[mrydel]

UW lost because they missed a chip shot extra point, not because of the penalty. This was not a 50 yard FG that need to be hit as a line drive. They just missed the extra point due to bad blocking. Should the penalty have been called? Probably not, but it was not the reason the game was lost.

[smudad]

I'm not sure I would 35 yards with the game on the line a 'cip shot'. I think we missed one last night with a lead, early in the game.

[mrydel]

I'm not sure I would 35 yards with the game on the line a 'cip shot'. I think we missed one last night with a lead, early in the game.

My point is that it was not of a distance that it needed to be a line drive kick. The kick was blocked, probably due to a bad job by someone on the line. Unless the official that made the call was also doing the blocking, it was not the fault of the official.

[smudad]

Should a college kicker make it from the 25 - 35 yeards? Probably. Do they miss, even from the 3? Absolutely! Is adding 15 highly questionable yeards to the effort a factor? Well it would certainly seem so to me - both in the effort by the kicker, the line being asked to block and the emational lift given the defense with the history of blocked EP's from that distance. Either way you cut it, the striped shirts made a difference based on a very marginal behavioral judgement.

That said, I'll bet the kid finds an official to give the ball to next time. Wonder what the rest of the team will do as pennance?

[mrydel]

Should a college kicker make it from the 25 - 35 yeards? Probably. Do they miss, even from the 3? Absolutely! Is adding 15 highly questionable yeards to the effort a factor? Well it would certainly seem so to me - both in the effort by the kicker, the line being asked to block and the emational lift given the defense with the history of blocked EP's from that distance. Either way you cut it, the striped shirts made a difference based on a very marginal behavioral judgement.

That said, I'll bet the kid finds an official to give the ball to next time. Wonder what the rest of the team will do as pennance?

Please list for me the difference in number of blocked extra points from the 3 and the 18. I would be very interested to see that. Apparently you have that number.

[J.T.supporta]

wasnt that officiating crew a Pac-10 crew?

they have been known to screw up games in the past. i.e. OU v. UO

[mrydel]

If the kicker had missed the extra point this could be an intelligent conversation. But the kick was blocked. I know of 2 extra points that were blocked yesterday (could have been more but I factually know of 2). One was at our game from the 3 yard line and one was at the UW/BYU game from the 18. I would say the odds are equal that it could happen from any spot on the field, bad call or not.

AND, although as I have said, I think the rule is wrong, it was the correct call by the rule book which clearly states if you throw the ball high in the air it is a penalty.

[Peruna_Ate_My_Rolex]

wasnt that officiating crew a Pac-10 crew?

they have been known to screw up games in the past. i.e. OU v. UO

Yeah, but they usually screw over the other team and not their own.