Our varsity game went well last night. A couple of rivals but the home team was in a down year. Visitors win 35 - 14 and both coaches are fine all night. But I had one of those "your kidding" moments with a couple of assistants from the visitors. Head coach was smart enough to stay out of it. After the visitors scored midway through the 4th quater to make it 28 - 14, the kickoff fools the returner just a bit. As the white hat, I have a good view of him back up from the 5 to the goal, realize he is back a bit far, and dive for the ball. His dive is just a bit short and he only has the ability while laying on the ground to deflect the ball. The ball rolls a few feet away, he gets up, pick up the ball and runs to the 22. The visitors assistants are screaming at me that he was down on the 3. Thier claim, he can't touch the ball while on the ground and not be down. I tried to explain the whole muff idea. That went nowhere. So I asked the assistant what he would have wanted me to do if his team had come down and recovered the ball after he had touched it. His answer, our ball. But you just told me he was down. At the glazed look, I blew the ready. Nothing like talking to assistant coaches.
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