Delay of Game
 

Sit.
Score 34-34, 3:29 left in the 4th quarter, 1st and 10 for A on B's 26 and A want to run as much clock a possible. Our back Judge is in his first year. I wind the clock on the ready for play and realize that A is going to wait to snap the ball. I yell at my BJ that delay of game is on 3:04. The BJ forgets to raise his hand with 10 seconds left in the play clock and does not count down the last five seconds, but throws the flag at 3:04. I know that I have to talk to the coach of A. He is upset, but handles himself well, considering the situation. He argues that we did not administrate the play correctly and I agree with him, that we screwed up. He wants us to pick up the flag. I tell him that I cannot do that.
In the locker room after the game we talked about how to prevent this from happening in the future. but once we throw the flag. Is there any way that we can fix it?

Nope, and I'd be pretty upset as the opposing coach if you did. Yea, the countdown should have been made - but that's a courtesy/recommended mechanic, not part of the rule itself. After all, they legitimately did take too long. That's on them in the end.

Agree with this as the primary takeaway from this.

My other thought on this is that part of the reason for the visual count is so the offense knows when the play clock is about to expire since in many cases they aren't looking at the game clock when the RfP is signaled to know when the play clock will expire. I'm assuming there was a visible game clock on the field based on you calling out the time that a DoG will occur. By audibly calling out when the DoG will occur, you've at least given the offense an opportunity to have that information absent a visual count. By specifically calling out what the game clock will show, you've created a de facto play clock. I'm not endorsing this as a standard practice, but it is an interesting point for thought.

If you know when the DOG is going to occur at 3:04 and see that the BJ is not doing his job at 3:14, verbally tell the quarterback "5 seconds". Might help you avoid having the situation.

Our direction in the State of Iowa is to NOT provide a visual chop to count down the play clock. It is felt that this provides an advantage to the offense because the defensive players can't see the BJ.

I updated the thread title because I was expecting to read about a dog running out onto the field and picking up the ball. :)

I understand the logic behind this, but a counter-argument could be that the being aware of the play clock status could be disadvantageous to defense if the defense relaxes on the assumption that a DoG foul is about to occur but doesn't.

There is also the argument that having a visual cue as to the status of the play clock assists the offense in avoiding a penalty, which could be an advantage to the offense. That advantage, however, has nothing to do with the defense being able to see the BJ.

How is this a disadvantage to the defense? They have absolutely no control whether the snap occurs prior to the play clock expiring.

How many coaches do they have on staff?

Not one of them could be bothered to look at the game clock when the RFP was blown? While the B should have given the signal and countdown (especially if it was communicated to the coaching staff that he/she would or that's the normal state mechanic), it doesn't absolve the coaches from doing their job - coaching their athletes based on the situation.

I had this same conversation with a head coach this summer after he was complaining that the down box was wrong and their is no way he could have possibly known it was fouth down.

I told him three things:

We should have fixed it before the snap.
The fact that we didn't doesn't absolve you and your staff of knowing the down.
We're going the other way.

Obviously, the coach didn't like it, but we weren't about to give him a 5th down.

Well, the first thing that an assistant said to me when I told them that we had a delay of game was:"30 seconds still has not run off the clock", I told him that the play clock in high school is 25 seconds.

Thanks for all the replies!!!