Rule Change

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Coaches take issue with game clock rule changes

The NCAA rules committee approved eight rules changes in May that will take effect for the 2006 college football season. And while the amendments range from the mundane (shortening halftime) to the marked (instant replay will be used throughout Division I-A for the first time), it's a rule change governing the game clock that has aroused some coaches' ire.

According to Rule 3-2-5, the game clock will start as soon as the ball is kicked in a kickoff situation. Previously, the clock would only start once the receiving team touched the ball. In addition, Rule 3-2-5-e states that, after a team gets a first down, the clock will begin running again on the ready-for-play signal. Previously, the clock did not resume until the team snapped the ball.

While the rationale behind the changes was to shorten the game, that explanation has done little to quell the outrage of some coaches.

"I am appalled at the rule changes," Oregon coach Mike Bellotti told USA Today. "They are major and very severe and will change the game as we know it."

Many coaches believe these changes will eliminate 10 to 15 plays per game.

"I think it will help the underdog teams," South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier told USA Today. "If you're the underdog, obviously you would like fewer plays in the game."

Penn State coach Joe Paterno brought out another perhaps unintended effect of the new rule.

"When you kick the ball, [the clock] starts. Kick it out of bounds with 8-10 seconds to go, the game's over," Paterno said to USA Today. "We've got to expose our kids to it in preseason practice."

Auburn head coach Tommy Tuberville, who sits on the NCAA rules committee, tried to answer some of the criticisms offered by his colleagues.

"We weren't looking to take plays away from the game," Tuberville told USA Today. "We were looking to … get away from some of these 3-hour, 45-minute games in hot weather or cold weather. This is obviously an experiment. Anything we do in the rules committee can be changed next year."

I don't know that I see this really speeding the game up that much or taking that many plays away. It's not like kickoffs are in the air for 50 seconds. Comments??

 
Anyone see this website?

We Hate The New Clock Rules

In addition, Ivan Maisel has this to say:

There's no sugarcoating it. The new clock rules are the worst change to happen to college football in the 20 years that I have covered it. Worse than the BCS formula, worse than Oregon's Fighting Hi-Liter uniforms, worse than banning the fumblerooskie.

 

College football fans have been defrauded. Tickets cost the same or are higher than a year ago, and yet the games offer considerably less football. It's the ol' grocery trick. A manufacturer shaves a couple of ounces off its package size without ratcheting down the price.

 

"We're not raising our prices!" the ads read.

 

Yes, but you're lowering the amount of the product. How is that good?

 

Take the Florida State-Miami game on Monday night. At the beginning of the third quarter, Florida State ran seven plays and punted. Miami ran three plays and punted. Two possessions. One first down. Only 8:01 remained in the third quarter.

 

With 2:19 to play in the game, Miami, trailing 13-10, punted the ball out of bounds at its 45-yard-line. Smart play, right? It didn't matter. The Hurricanes, trailing 13-10, still had to use one of their timeouts to stop the clock until Florida State snapped it.

 

The two teams combined for 110 offensive plays. So did Oklahoma and UAB on Saturday, the fewest number of snaps in a Sooners game in the last 50 years. That's also 17 fewer than the average for the rest of the I-A games on the first weekend and a whopping 31.4 plays fewer than the average in 2005.

 

Think about that. The Hurricanes and the Seminoles played nearly an entire quarter of football less than the average game a year ago.

 

"We don't want it to be 55 plays per team. That was not the intention," said Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville, a member of the NCAA Football Rules Committee, which made the change after last season. "The intention was to cut the length of the game down."

 

Tuberville said the committee wanted to make the games shorter for the welfare of the players, who are playing one extra game per season.

 

Style of play has some effect on the number of plays. Notre Dame and Georgia Tech scored only one more point than did Florida State and Miami, yet the Fighting Irish and the Yellow Jackets combined for 130 plays. The Georgia Tech defense forced Notre Dame to attack wide, and the Irish went out of bounds regularly.

 

Coaches are upset, which is interesting, because coaches make up most of the membership of the NCAA Football Rules Committee. That's the group that adopted the change last winter after a few bowl games ran longer than "The Brothers Karamazov."

 

"We had 10 possessions," Florida coach Urban Meyer said Monday in his press conference of the Gators' 34-7 victory over Southern Mississippi. "That is not enough. You work awful hard and 10 possessions are just not enough. Alabama, LSU, and Ole Miss had nine. … Last year we averaged 14 possessions a game and we are down to 10 now."

 

Texas A&M coach Dennis Franchione said, "If you want to know how I like the rule changes, I don't. I just did not think we needed to do that. After one game, I'd still say that. Maybe I'll change as we go through the season. I'm willing to give it time to see. I don't like it."

 

Tuberville wants to see teams play five or six games before he makes any definitive comments about the rule. I don't. The committee had good intentions, but made a poor decision. The rule needs to be changed.

 
The rule is crap. The coaches, players, and fans hate it...but now it means football games can run in their allotted time slots for TV. Thanks, NCAA. Selling out your members to back a buck.

 
This is a dumb rule. Hopefully they get smarter and get rid of it. Why make the games shorter? I want to watch football.

 
Remember this is just a trial rule. If enough people b!^@h about it, they can change it back next year. We should start a petition.

 
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