Watching the Louisville-USFgame. Why are the wing officials and the umpire holding up their hands when they blow their whistles at the end of the down?

I presume that you are refering to the "dead ball" signal. Gerald Austin (NFL Referee #34) is the CUSA FB official's supervisor. That is an NFL mechanic to indicate that the ball is dead inbounds and to start the 40 second play clock in the NFL, even though it is not necessary in NCAA or NF play. If you watch the CUSA officials, they use other NFL mechanics such as using their hat to indicate that a receiver has gone out of bounds on his own.

Tulane-UAB
 

In the C-USA Tulane-UAB game, the wing officials did not very many opportunities to raise their hands.

Final: Tulane 59
UAB 55

I don't think anybody was tackled in-bounds.

### The "Hat" toss is now standard NCAA mechanics. Yes, it filtered down from the NFL.

Thanks. That's what it looked like. Just doesn't make sense when there is no 40-second clock.

REPLY: I have a friend in C-USA. They also use blue bean bags like the NFL.

I seen the R indicate "television timeout" just like the NFL. Looks like an Unsportsmanlike Conduct signal.

I just saw a few plays from the Syracuse/West Virginia game last Thursday, and the U (a Big East Crew), also put his hand up at the end of the play. Not that this looks bad in some way, it just looks kinda "dumb" when only one official is doing that.

In re. to the bean bags, I know in the Big 10 they are also using blue bean bags.

Why not? I think it's a great visual when watching film/TV. It says "the play is over."

Not all NFL mechanics are dumb and the NFL was using this LONG BEFORE there was a play clock that started with this signal.

--Rich

I don't think the mechanic in and of itself is "dumb" (not my best choice of words, but oh well); I just don't think it looks too good when one official is doing it, and the others are not.

Seems to me we used to do that in NF about 30 years ago when I started doing FB.

Anyone else remember?

We sure did. But has it been 30 years??????

I can't remember when we stopped, but I know we did it way back when. Back then we had no stripes on our socks. I must be showing my age!

No stripes and we wore white socks over our black stirrups. We also used red penalty flags.

Amen on the stirrups. I remember seeing red flags when I was a kid. I still think that red flags would be appropriate on a dry field for an afternoon game. The yellow is hard to see against the "straw."