Before this game the crew anticipated a pretty close contest. This was the first week of Conference play, and both squads were 1-4 coming off their first victory. We expected both teams to be hungry for a win. But (you knew there was a but coming) apparently only one team wanted to play. The final score was 55-21 after three hours of misery.
On several levels this was the worse college game I worked so far. First of all, the home team A.D. was nowhere to be found, we had neither a clock operator nor a chain crew until after the coin toss was completed. The chain crew consisted of three females from the Basketball team, one of which had her young child with her. Our White Hat quickly shut that down. Basically, the game started late while all this administrative BS took place.
At halftime the chain crew announced they were not coming back for the second half. Are you kidding! So, we had to find four more people to assist and the second half started late. Oh, what else -- the 25 second clock never started on the kick-offs, the ball boys were in la-la land, we did not have our security escort, and the locker room was not open at halftime or at the end of the game. And remember, this is NCAA, not High School.
As bad as all that was the game itself wasn't any better. The visiting coach was one of these guys who thinks calling a fair game means the fouls should be equally distributed. He was given a Sideline Warning three minutes into the game, so you kinda knew what kind of an ass he was going to be. So, since most of the fouls were against his team, we apparently were not being 'fair'. I didn't get the final count, but there were at least 35 fouls in total and I would guess 25 were against his team. Most of these were Personal Fouls or Unsportsmanlike. These fouls went both ways, as this was really an ugly game, but his team was hit harder because they deserved it. They were just playing dirty. I could have thrown more fouls on his team, but the White Hat asked us to only call 'big' things.
When the visitors finally scored a TD, during the Try, a home team player jumped into the neutral zone and then jumped back before the snap. After the Try, when I have to run up the sideline for the kickoff, the coach was screaming at me that the defender contacted his player when he entered the neutral zone. I politely said, "Coach I did not see contact" and kept running up the field. Now, how he could possibly see what really happened from the sideline 25 yards away is beyond me. What really happened is when the defender entered the neutral zone and his player false started. In that order. But since there was no flag by the wings who really cares. The player who is at the most disadvantage is the defender on his heels not his offensive player. The coach of course questioned how I could not see the contact when it was right in front of me. I learned long ago there is no point discussing these things. I clearly saw what didn't happen. I asked the wings later if they saw contact and they both said, hell no.
Later in the game he actually said, "this is not the PAC-10, why are you guys calling that?". Well, lets see, your man was holding in the end zone and your team scored a TD. Even in High School we would make this call. Now granted, there was 1:30 left in a game that was 55-21, so ya, he has a point. But, a foul is a foul ,and because he had been a prick all night, no cheap scores for you friend.
And just maybe we make these call because we all WANT to get into the PAC-10. It wasn't my flag, but I would have made the same call in that situation.
There is a lot more I could say about this coach, but I save that for WAMO.
Now, to be honest, this was not my best game either. My biggest blunder was not walking off two penalties properly. The first was a half-distance from the 24 yard line. How hard is this. Go to the 12 dumbass. I stopped at the 17. The side judge caught this one so I didn't look like a complete fool. Then we had a spot foul two yards beyond the LOS. I went from the LOS. I had to pick-up the ball and move it. A big time no-no for the Umpire. I'm sure I'll get marked down for that. And I should.
A few times in the first-half I was dwelling on these blunders too much and forgot which side to relay the ball from on a change of posession. No one in the stands will notice this and it won't be on film, but it shows my head is not in the game. Overall, my first-half was terrible and if I was and observer, I would say I did not appear to have control of the game and at times, I appeared confused. I got my act together in the second half and did not make any more stupid mistakes.
I threw three flags -- Roughing the Snapper, Block in the Back, and a False Start.
Luckily I don't have either of these teams again this season,
