We won’t get screwed again; SEC officials – hold my beer
It was bad enough the Arkansas Razorbacks were cheated out of a win against the Auburn Tigers back on the third game of the season Oct.
10. In a blatant missed call where Auburn quarterback Bo Nix spiked the ball behind him, which is officially a fumble, the officials blew the play dead assuming Nix spiked it to stop the clock.
At least the Southeastern Conference had the cahones to come out with an official statement a few hours after the Tigers ended up beating the Hogs 30-28 on a game-winning field goal:
“During the 3rd down play a 0:30 in the 4th quar
TONY’S TAKE ter, the officials on the field sounded their whistles and blew the play dead as they deemed the passer illegally grounded the ball to conserve time as governed by Rule 7-3-2-f.
“During the subsequent replay review, there is conclusive video evidence that the pass was backwards. However, because the recovery of the football was not clearly made in the immediate continuing football action, the ruling on the field was determined to stand under Rule 12-3-2-e-1. Both the determination of the backward pass and the immediate clear recovery are required to reverse the ruling on the field under Rule 12-3-2-e-1.”
Just sounded like a fancy way of saying, ‘Yeah, you got screwed, but who cares?’ Arkansas safety Joe Foucha did recover that fumble. Granted, it was not made in the immediate continuing football action, but that was because the officials blew the play dead when they shouldn’t have.
Fast forward to over a month later, a week ago today to be precise, and the Razorbacks get screwed again, this time against the LSU Tigers and another horrible SEC officiating crew led by white hat Marc Curles.
Let me say this about the LSU game. The Hogs might not have won against LSU, like they should have against Auburn, but the officiating led by Curles and Company made it almost impossible to win.
There were two main calls that were absolutely blown by the crew. The first came with 11 and a half minutes left until halftime at the Tiger 37 when LSU running back John Emery fumbled it away … well not quite. First the officials said Emery was down and then went to replay, with Curles coming away with, “After further review, although the ball was clearly fumbled, there was no clear recovery of the ball so the ruling on the field stands.” It was Foucha again who recovered this one.
The announcers even said, “Oh wow. I don’t know how that’s possible. And if you’re an Arkansas fan you’re going, ‘Not again.’
It’s clearly Arkansas’ ball. That’s a really bad call.”
The Razorbacks would end up recovering a fumble later in the series, but it was 50 yards down the field and not in LSU territory.
And then of course the targeting call on Arkansas defensive back Jalen Catalon, for which he was ejected. The Razorbacks were up 24-20 with about seven minutes to go in the game. Catalon lays out an LSU receiver, sure, but it was nowhere close to helmet-to-helmet. At that point, Catalon was the player of the game defensively for the Hogs with 16 tackles,
1.5 for loss, and a pass breakup.
Again, not helmet to helmet, no head or neck, receiver was not defenseless, so not targeting, right? But Curles ejects Catalon anyway.
Again, the announcers, like most any rational person, didn’t agree with the call.
“Other than avoid the receiver entirely, I don’t know what else he (Catalon) can do,” the announcer said. “He’s turned completely sideways. I’m not even sure there’s head or neck.”
There wasn’t. You know what else there wasn’t anything of … an official statement by the SEC about their officials’ horrible officiating, even a week later. The SEC proves time and again they’re not going to hold their officials accountable, no matter how bad they are.