My game this week...

[Rich]

Originally Posted by DrMooreReferee

Team A is leading 28-12. Team A's coach has been a total jerk for the entire game. His team has had numerous deadball PFs during the game. All that being said, his team was indeed the superior team in this game, and the score showed it.

So, back to the game. Team A leads 28-12. They get the ball back late in the 4th, like 40 seconds left. They run a play and get it down to the 10 yardline of B. Then they call a timeout with 15 seconds left. And they still have one TO remaining. They still have all the starters in the game. They run their play. Its a TD on an off tackle run. We have 2 flags at the point of attack, holding on #50. We mark off the penalty, and there is 9 seconds left. There is lots of smack being talked. Team B surely doesn't like the fact that this team is trying to run up the score. Players are mouthing at each other. At this point, I just had a bad feeling about the way this game was ending. I marked the ball ready for play AND wound the clock. And then turned my back so I wouldn't be able to see team A trying to call a TO. As it turns out, the rest of the crew followed suit. Clock runs out, game over, I hold up the ball. I know the clock should have started on the snap. I also know we had a foul on the last timed down, therefore an untimed down. But still, I just felt like this game needed to end. Anyway, coach of Team A was mad as heck. Had a few things to say as I walked off the field.

Any thoughts? Anyone ever had anything like this? How did you handle it?

Thanks

You aren't going to hear anything but "BRAVO" from me. What has happened to sportsmanship? At least where I live, they'd be taking a knee at this point.

[The Roamin' Umpire]

Sounds like good game management in my book. Let me relate an experience of mine...

My second year I had a clock assignment for a playoff game. Home team dominated most of the game, and things got a bit chippy in the fourth quarter.

Visitors scored with something like 8-10 seconds left, but it doesn't matter at that point - they're still down by something like 20. So we have a kickoff, a decent return that ends OOB, and I stop the clock... and then look up to see :01 showing. Then I start berating myself for being an idiot. Sure enough, home team lines up to take a knee, visiting player comes flying over the line to take a cheap shot, fight ensues.

Now, I know the fight isn't my fault, but I bear some responsibility for it since I likely could have prevented it by looking at the clock before stopping it. (Of course, no one had ever suggested this situation to me before - a flaw in our training I requested be fixed, and it didn't occur to me until right after I'd stopped it.)

Is running the clock a few seconds in situations like this the technically correct thing to do? No. Is it the right and smart thing to do? No question in my mind.