The NCAA on Wednesday issued a rules clarification designed to close the loophole Oregon exploited during its 32-31 victory over Ohio State last Saturday.
The Ducks — apparently intentionally — put 12 men on the field in the final moments of their game vs. the Buckeyes, resulting in a 5-yard penalty, but also eating valuable time off the clock. Left with only six seconds and no timeouts remaining, Ohio State was unable to get in range for a game-winning field goal attempt before time expired.
According to a statement issued by NCAA Football Secretary-Rules Editor Steve Shaw, when a defensive team has 12 or more players on the field during a play after the two-minute timeout in either half, the offensive team will now have the option to both accept the penalty and have the game clock reset to the time at the previous snap. The game clock will then re-start on the snap.
However, if the 12th defender is attempting to leave the field at the snap and has no influence on the play, there would be no clock adjustment after the penalty.
“Football is a very dynamic game,” Shaw said. “Occasionally there are specific situations where committing a penalty can give a team an advantage. A guiding principle of the NCAA Football Rules Committee is that there should be no benefit when a team commits a penalty. The goal of this in-season interpretation is to eliminate a potential clock advantage for committing a substitution foul and take away any gain for the defense if they violate the substitution rule.”
During his Monday press briefing, Oregon coach Dan Lanning stopped short of admitting that his team intentionally committed the 12 men on the field penalty vs. Ohio State in order to take time off the clock. However, he didn’t deny it, either.
“There was a timeout before that — we spend an inordinate amount of time on situations,” Lanning said, via Yahoo Sports. “There’s some situations that don’t show up very often in college football but this is one that obviously was something we had worked on. So you can see the result.”
