Riley seeks clarity on targeting
NORMAN — CeeDee Lamb’s hit on Tulane’s Taris Shenall doesn’t figure to have any major repercussions for Oklahoma in Saturday’s game at Baylor.
Lamb’s ejection for targeting occurred in the first half, meaning he won’t be suspended at all for this weekend’s game.
But Monday, two days after Lamb was ejected in an eventual 56-14 win, the call and the targeting rule were still at the forefront of discussions about the Sooners.
First-year Sooners head coach Lincoln Riley said he’d had a brief conversation with Big 12 coordinator of officials Walt Anderson, who called Sunday night’s NFL game between Green Bay and Atlanta, and planned to have lengthier discussion with him concerning the call.
“We were told that they agreed with the call, that CeeDee hit the guy in the head,” Riley said. “When I watched it, I honestly had a hard time seeing that. I’ve watched it a bunch. I understand those things are close and I understand that they are going to err on the side of safety. I don’t disagree with that at all.”
Replays showed Lamb
hit Shenall with his shoulder in the upper chest area, though the impact caused Shenall’s head to whip forward — not backward — and hit Lamb’s back. The television angle from the back of the play seems to show Lamb’s helmet making contact, but the other angle clearly shows that Lamb’s helmet was past Shenall’s when the contact occurred.
Lamb’s ejection is the latest that highlights the targeting rule and some of the misconceptions surrounding it.
Targeting is called for when a player makes forcible contact — with the helmet, forearm, hand, fist, elbow or shoulder — with the head and neck area of a defenseless player.
Had the ejection been overturned on replay, the penalty would’ve been waived off, and Jeff Badet would’ve been awarded a 44-yard touchdown run. Riley said he didn’t disagree with the characterization of Shenall as a defenseless player, though defenseless players are allowed to be blocked legally.
“When you get in a peelback-type situation, that player is defenseless. We agree with him on that,” Riley said. “The question is now was there contact — was there head-to-head contact. Was there contact in that above-the-shoulder area?
"I get it. It’s close. You look
at some of the views and you say, ‘no way.’ You look at a couple of them and you see maybe. I think the player’s reaction and the fact that the head never really snapped back was maybe my biggest point. But I understand that it’s close.”
While Riley sees doubt, replay officials needed certainty to overturn the call.
“When in question, it is a foul,” the rule book reads, repeating the phrase several times during the description of the complete targeting rule.
But Riley contends that the call should only be made — and upheld — when there is certainty.
“If you’re going to tell officials to throw anything that’s close, then, in my opinion, it should be clear evidence that it absolutely, 100 percent happened because of how severe the penalty is,” Riley said. “If the penalty was just a 15-yarder and not an ejection, I could get. But in my opinion the fact that it also brings along an ejection, let’s make sure that he 100 percent hit him in the head. I don’t think
either one of us can sit here and say 100 percent either way.”
Oklahoma players largely avoided questions about the targeting call both after Saturday’s game and Monday, though safety Steven Parker said it was difficult to balance making a good, clean football play and targeting.
“It’s a little difficult,” Parker said. “There’s times where it happens kind of accidentally or incidental. But you have those times where sometimes it does look like it’s pretty bad or it’s on purpose, but I don’t feel like anybody actually does that.”
Riley said on both occasions that Lamb did what he was coached to do, but said that coaching has to be altered now.
“I can remember several years ago, we used to chart peelback blocks,” Riley said. “That was a badge of honor. That was like earning your stripes as a receiver. Not any more. We’ve had to change over the years, and it’s something we talk about often.”