It's Time for the NCAA to Be Consistent With D-I Football

Most are already aware of the inconsistencies in NCAA Division I football. 

The top schools with the most tradition and the most capital get the most preferential treatment. Those are the schools that wind up in the BCS bowls the vast majority of the time.

Those are the programs with the deeper booster base, so they are allotted some margin of error even with scheduling weaker opponents.

That’s a tough load to handle if you’re not totally on board with the smaller D-I programs missing out on opportunities earned. 

Take the Utah Utes last season, who had to play Alabama, a team currently pushing for the BCS National Championship. Utah did not get to play for the National Championship, but they did manhandle the Crimson Tide in their bowl game. 

Alabama will eventually get an invite to the big dance if it keeps pace with its current undefeated record.

So where is the justice off the field? Well the reality and worst kept secret is that it does not exist in college football. 

It is bad enough the politics of college football plagues teams from getting the opportunities that should be rightfully their own.

Over the weekend another more problematic issue took hold on the field of play. Maybe you were able to catch it, maybe you weren’t, but the net result is this one fact played out on national TV coverage on Saturday afternoon.

It’s time for the NCAA to be consistent with D-I football.

There are two games where there were glaring differences in the way things were handled by the officials and it really transcends the field of play. It’s a disturbing sight to see in both regards, and at the end of the day there absolutely needs to be consistency.

In a game that was promoted as another segment of the “Greatest Rivalry of the Decade in the SEC” LSU visited Georgia, between the hedges. In a tightly contested game which did not need further hype or drama, the game had some controversy that severely impacted the end result of the game.

With 2:53 remaining in the game, LSU running back Charles Scott banged home a go-ahead touchdown from just inside the three yard line. This wound up putting LSU up 12-7 with less than three minutes remaining in the game as Georgia stuffed the two point try.

The first point here is there was a short celebratory dog pile in the end zone by LSU that was not called.

Georgia took control at their own 21-yard line. Quarterback Joe Cox wound up leading Georgia on a 79-yard drive that resulted in a touchdown with 1:09 remaining on the clock. 

On the play Cox threw a 16-yard jump ball to his right where he hooked up with star receiver A.J. Green for the go-ahead score.

Georgia was then penalized for excessive celebration in the end zone. The penalty was called most directly on Green. After the touchdown Green showed no signs of taunting or excessive celebration on his part as he was embracing his own teammates.

So it’s bad enough that excessive celebration was called against Georgia. It’s much worse that it impacted the following kickoff with a 15 yard penalty against the Bulldogs. This forced a kickoff from the 15 yard line of Georgia.   

Georgia had an additional penalty on the kickoff which placed the ball at their own 38-yard line for LSU.

With the score 13-12 in favor a Georgia, LSU was already in field goal range. It was somewhat moot after Charles Scott rambled 33 yards on the second play from scrimmage for the touchdown.

What happened next can only be described as this: The officiating was so bad that they HAD to do a make up call!

The problem here was that LSU was now flagged for excessive celebration. Furthermore it did not appear as though there was any reason to throw the flag against LSU other than the admission of an initial bad call by the officials. 

At this point it is virtually irrelevant because the damage was done to Georgia with only 42 seconds left on the clock to respond.

Perhaps this could be thought of as just a test case and the end of story. But wait a moment, it gets even better than that.

A few minutes later in real time on another national broadcast something similar happened with an entirely different result.

On Saturday the Washington Huskies paid a visit to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in South Bend. A game that Washington appeared to have in hand much of the game eventually slipped away. 

In this game it was Notre Dame who truly were celebrating to the point that it should have been flagged for being excessive. The only problem here is that it was not called.  Not only was it not called once, but it was not called twice following the two point conversion which was also excessive in nature as well.

It may have never happened had a controversial touchdown run by Washington back Chris Polk not have been reversed. The referees made a decision that Polk was aided by teammates in getting into the end zone.

Interestingly enough Notre Dame had a touchdown and two point try that clearly favored the Irish and cast everything else to the wind with 1:20 remaining in the contest. 

The Irish did have very clear excessive celebrations in the end zone after their go-ahead touchdown and two-point conversion. What made matters worse in the eyes of the Husky faithful is that there was a very clear case of aiding the runner that was not called against Notre Dame. 

This happened shortly after the Huskies' touchdown was reversed.

Notre Dame fullback Robert Hughes kept his legs driving while getting clear assistance from his teammates to increase the Notre Dame lead to three late in the game.

So what stands out is the inconsistency in NCAA officiating and the administration of how these situations wind up impacting the credibility of the product on the field.

How the NCAA chooses to address these issues in the future is anybody’s guess, but the reality is still plain and crystal clear.

It’s time for the NCAA to be consistent with D-I football both on the field of play with rules and the officiating of games. Additionally there needs to be further action in the handling of off the field issues like giving every D-I program an opportunity to play for the BCS Championship. 

Regardless of the impact one thing remains the same.

It’s time for the NCAA to be consistent with D-I football.

Contact Chaz at [e-mail].