PAC 12 2019 Season Thread

[FearlessF]

attendance of 51,164 for a single game in Lincoln would get even Scott Frost booted

[CatsbyAZ]

As we get into the round of this weekend’s coming games, thought I’d post local commentary aimed at last week’s losing coaches:

https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/10/pac-12-coaches-under-fire-petersen-shaw-kelly-face-national-media-scrutiny-following-bad-losses/

“It’s completely legitimate to look at Chris Petersen’s tenure as a big success, having reached three consecutive New Year’s Six bowl games (including one Playoff berth) along with top-15 finishes. At the same time, the Huskies seem to carry around a whiff of fraudulence.
“They rarely beat anyone good and pretty consistently drop one or two games a year against pretty mediocre opponents while everyone acts as if it’s a shock. But at this point, it’s not a shock that Washington lost to California, 20-19, in a game that was delayed 2 1/2 hours due to severe weather. While the circumstances of the game were odd, the problem was predictable — the Huskies’ offense turned the ball over twice and settled for four field goals after long drives.

“For Washington, a team many people had pegged into this year’s Playoff, this one goes right alongside losses last season to Oregon and Cal (again) in which its offense just wasn’t good enough and 2017 when the Huskies removed themselves from Playoff contention with losses to unranked Arizona State and Stanford.”

“The Cardinal finished in the top-10 in four of David Shaw’s first five seasons. That steadiness earns you the benefit of the doubt in the preseason, but the Stanford of the last few years has been fairly underwhelming and is no longer one of the dominant smashmouth teams in the country. USC, an embattled program with a freshman quarterback, had little trouble with Stanford in a 45-20 win. Stanford generated a paltry 98 rushing yards against USC and 132 in their season opener against Northwestern. Are there no more Christian McCaffreys or Bryce Loves out there?”

“UCLA: Bleh. Everything about this experiment with Chip Kelly so far is just … bleh. Saturday’s 23-14 loss to San Diego State in front of a ton of empty seats at the Rose Bowl really wasn’t even worth a second glance. We know UCLA’s personnel isn’t great, but when you hire a supposed offensive genius to be your coach is it too much to ask for more than 261 yards (just 62 rushing) against a Group of Five team at home in Year 2?”

[CatsbyAZ]

5 years ago today

By far the best finish to a football game that I've personally attended


https://twitter.com/AZDesertSwarm/status/1175103516131463168

[Brutus Buckeye]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oN0V9RpnS8Y

[CatsbyAZ]

From the Mercury News: https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/22/pac-12-issues-statement-on-officiating-in-cal-mississippi-game/

For the second consecutive Sunday, the Pac-12 issued a statement in response to actions by its officials — or, rather, inactions.

Last week, the conference confirmed that its on-field and replay booth officials failed to properly penalize an Arizona State player for leaping to attempt to block a last-second, game-tying field goal by Michigan State.

Had the penalty been called, the Spartans would have had a chip-shot to force overtime.

The officials blew it, and the conference acknowledged as much under the new transparency policy, which governs mistakes involving:

But the issue this weekend in the wild finish to the Cal-Mississippi game carries far more nuance.

The conference announced it would have “supported play being stopped by Instant Replay for further review to confirm the on-field call of the second to last play of the game.”

If you’re unfamiliar …

Cal led 28-20 in the final seconds when a third-down completion by the Rebels was spotted inside the one yard-line by the Side Judge, who had a clear look at the play.

The receiver’s legs were in the end zone, but the ball was determined to have not crossed the plane.

Ole Miss was without timeouts and had to rush to the line to get a play off before time expired.

The ball was spotted quickly by the Umpire.

Quarterback John Rhys Plumlee had no choice but to take the snap with two seconds left and charge forward in a desperate attempt to draw the Rebels within a two-point conversion of overtime.

He was stuffed by Cal’s defense, and the game ended.

The controversy, however, was just starting.

Mississippi’s interim athletic director, Keith Carter, later issued a statement on Twitter:

“We are extremely disappointed by the officiating at the end of the game and are expecting a full explanation from the Pac-12 regarding the call and subsequent non-review of the 3rd down play. We feel strongly that the play should have been reviewed by the Pac-12 officials in the review booth. Even if the play didn’t result in a touchdown, the spot of the ball on 4th down was questionable.”

The Pac-12 conference reviewed the play on Sunday and determined that its officials on the field made the correct call and “there was no irrefutable video evidence to reverse those calls by replay.”

[FearlessF]

sounds like whining from the SEC

I did not see the play or replay

[Cincydawg]

I thought he was pretty clearly stopped short of the goal line.  Whether it merited a review is an opinion, I have seen reviews of less close plays.

[FearlessF]

it's my opinion that we have FAR too many reviews

[Cincydawg]

Two lockers down from me at fantasy camp was a fellow who is a Pac 12 white hat referee.  I had a few interesting chats with him about how they prepare and what is toughest to call.   He struck me as a competent sort with a lot of reffing experience at lower levels.  They aren't perfect, but I presume they are honest brokers.

[betarhoalphadelta]

Cal led 28-20 in the final seconds when a third-down completion by the Rebels was spotted inside the one yard-line by the Side Judge, who had a clear look at the play.

The receiver’s legs were in the end zone, but the ball was determined to have not crossed the plane.

Ole Miss was without timeouts and had to rush to the line to get a play off before time expired.

The ball was spotted quickly by the Umpire.

Quarterback John Rhys Plumlee had no choice but to take the snap with two seconds left and charge forward in a desperate attempt to draw the Rebels within a two-point conversion of overtime.

He was stuffed by Cal’s defense, and the game ended.

The controversy, however, was just starting.

Mississippi’s interim athletic director, Keith Carter, later issued a statement on Twitter:

“We are extremely disappointed by the officiating at the end of the game and are expecting a full explanation from the Pac-12 regarding the call and subsequent non-review of the 3rd down play. We feel strongly that the play should have been reviewed by the Pac-12 officials in the review booth. Even if the play didn’t result in a touchdown, the spot of the ball on 4th down was questionable.”

Okay, so how does this work?

A booth review takes time. Typically the guy in the booth needs enough time to get a look at a replay to determine if a review is necessary. 

That's specifically why teams rush up to the line and snap the ball ASAP to get a play off before the replay official can signal down to the field that a review is necessary.

So what happened here?

Ole Miss was without timeouts and had to rush to the line to get a play off before time expired.

The ball was spotted quickly by the Umpire.

So what would they have preferred? 


That the umpire not spot the ball quickly, so they didn't have time to get a play off? 

That somehow, in defiance of all rules where the replay official has to signal down to the field, and in defiance of the laws of time and space, that somehow someone magically would have been able to determine a review was necessary before the snap?

If there had been 25 seconds left on the clock, and Ole Miss had enough time to slow-roll the play call and snap the ball with 2-3 seconds left on the game clock, there would have been enough time for the replay official to view the replay and signal to the field. But there wasn't enough time to do that, so what exactly are they bitching about?

[FearlessF]

bitching because they lost

sore losers

[CatsbyAZ]

What do you guys think of Stanford thus far this season? I think they're in the midst of a continuing program decline that started in 2016.

So far this year they 1) beat a Northwestern program that never starts seasons as well as they finish, were 2) swamped 45-20 by a USC team that had to replace their QB midway through the game, 3) blown out by Central Florida 45 - 27, 4) physically beaten up by Oregon 21-7, 5) before holding on to outlast Oregon State this past weekend.

Part of this season's setbacks are injury related (for instance to QB Costello and OT Little) but penalties are up as are big plays given up by a usually more disciplined defense.

Depth is beginning to be a glaring problem, which leads to an issue not often mentioned with David Shaw: the last few seasons Shaw undersigns classes. Right now Shaw is willingly fielding a roster with only 77 scholarship players, which in aggregate leaves 1 to 2 less DT/DE in the DL rotation, 1 to 2 less OL in the rotation, etc. (Shaw's recruiting strategy is to land four to five monster recruits, especially along the Lines, and at QB, while never really rounding out or balancing the rest of the roster.)

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And when injuries hit the lines Freshman are thrown onto the field, starters having to play every snap are exhausted in the 3rd quarter, and the gameplan gets stripped down and predictable to accommodate the lack of experience on the field. This has been going on to a lesser degree for the last three seasons, which have been masked by finishing seasons 10-3 (2016), 9-5 (2017) and 9-4 (2018).

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Even though Stanford wasn't maintaining their previous Rose Bowl success, it wasn't until THIS season that the decline looks more so irreversible.

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Stanford, currently 2 - 3 with tough games left against Washington, WSU, Cal, and Notre Dame, is looking at a 5-7/6-6 season without prospects looking much better next season.

[Cincydawg]

Yeah, they may be sliding back to mediocrity or worse, an Illinois kind of thing.

[CWSooner]

. . . Depth is beginning to be a glaring problem, which leads to an issue not often mentioned with David Shaw: the last few seasons Shaw undersigns classes. Right now Shaw is willingly fielding a roster with only 77 scholarship players, which in aggregate leaves 1 to 2 less DT/DE in the DL rotation, 1 to 2 less OL in the rotation, etc. (Shaw's recruiting strategy is to land four to five monster recruits, especially along the Lines, and at QB, while never really rounding out or balancing the rest of the roster.)  . . .

Does signing five monsters max out his budget?