As public criticism of college football referees intensifies, it’s up to those in charge to remain calm
Utah athletic director Mark Harlan should know better.
Just last year, he served on the College Football Playoff selection committee, which was besieged by threats so ugly and violent they required police attention after Florida State was left out of the four-team CFP field. But Saturday night, after a late defensive holding penalty helped BYU beat the Utes, Harlan questioned the competence and integrity of the Big 12 officials working the game.
“This game was absolutely stolen from us,” Harlan said minutes after the 22-21 loss at Utah, in a highly unusual appearance by an AD at his team’s post-game press conference. “We were excited about being in the Big 12, but tonight I’m not.”
Even setting aside the fact that the call that set Harlan off was far from egregious, at a time when officials are being hammered mercilessly and more fans than ever seem to believe that conferences protect their best teams through oblique leadership, a person in a leadership position in college sports, these flames must not be fanned.
Best angle yet. Clear violation.
— Terry McAulay (@tjmcaulay) November 10, 2024
More often, it is the coaches who speak out about their actions, and it appears that they too have become more emboldened to publicly air their grievances, as Kirby Smart did after Georgia overcame a key rescinded pass interference penalty in October’s victory in Texas.
Kirby Smart calls out ESPN and the referees pic.twitter.com/p19AVxVRTq
— NMD Grant (@NMDgrant) October 20, 2024
Officiating in college football needs to improve, especially as stakes and revenues continue to rise. But the men and women who perform these jobs — just like the selection committee that snubbed Florida State — are doing their best with a difficult task. College football isn’t necessarily in crisis, but it could be headed for a crisis of confidence if those within the sport continue to feed the conspiracy theorists.
“As you get into November, there are a lot of moving pieces,” said former Wyoming coach Craig Bohl, who is now executive director of the American Football Coaches Association. “You may come down to a conference championship, entry into the CFP, emotions are running high, but I think as coaches we will be better served if we recognize that those officials are well trained, adequately resourced, and oftentimes it sees look different on Sunday. And I have found over the years that things are better served with offline conversations.”
Harlan was fined $40,000 and reprimanded by the Big 12. He didn’t fully apologize.
“My comments came after I had just left our team locker room where our student-athletes were in pain and upset,” Harlan said. “The University of Utah is proud to be a member of the Big 12 Conference and we look forward to working with our colleagues to continue to improve the competition. BYU, Coach (Kelani) Sitake and their coaches and student-athletes are having a great season and we wish them all the best.”
Last weekend, the Mountain West also issued a public reprimand to San Jose State coach Ken Niumatalolo for his comments about his performance in the game against Oregon State.
And elsewhere in the Big 12, somewhat overlooked because of Harlan’s rant, Texas Tech coach Joey McGuire was going through a laundry list of missed calls after the Red Raiders lost to coach Deion Sanders and Colorado.
“In a game like this we have to be better and I guarantee Deion will sit there and say he has to be better, but the referee has to be better at this level,” McGuire said.
Steve Shaw, the national coordinator of college football officials and editor of the NCAA rules, said he doesn’t see the recent headlines this season as a trend.
“There is generally healthy internal dialogue between coaches and conference coordinators of officials each week,” Shaw said in a statement The Athletics. “There have been a few high-profile situations in a more public forum lately, but I don’t consider this a resurgence.”
Terry McAulay, a former NFL official who also worked as a coordinator of officials in the Big East and American Athletic Conference, said he understands sometimes questioning the competency of those in stripes.
“I understand. It comes with the territory,” said McAulay, who now works as NBC’s rules analyst for NFL and college games and isn’t shy about criticizing the work of officials. “But when you use the word ‘stolen’, it’s a different mentality. That comes from a different world where you’re questioning their credibility and integrity, and that’s where I always draw the line.”
He said he doesn’t believe the civil service is getting worse, but he doesn’t see it improving nationally either. What is happening instead is that the number of top officials is not keeping pace with the increasing size of the power conferences. That leads to more high-profile games being led by teams further down the depth charts of those leagues.
McAulay has been advocating for years to move away from conferences overseeing officials, largely to avoid the perception problems that now exist when leagues can be accused of profiting from certain outcomes.
When Miami won three straight games earlier this season in which questionable replay reviews ran their course, many fans were convinced the ACC was protecting the Hurricanes’ undefeated record to boost the conference’s chances of advancing multiple teams to the 12-team College Football Playoff to send.
“If there’s a controversial decision and the conference goes $15 million ahead, ‘Oh God, we just made a mistake.’ Better luck next time. Let’s see if we can be even better.’ If it cost the conference $15 million, eh,” McAulay said.
For the record, McAulay believes Miami took advantage of misjudgment decisions within that stretch: on Virginia Tech’s game-ending Hail Mary, which was initially ruled a catch but overturned after review, and on a possible missed targeting call late in the Cal game that extended a key Golden Bears drive. But, he said, the Miami fumble was overturned on review and ruled an incomplete pass in the Louisville game was the correct call.
This is not necessarily a new phenomenon. Former conference commissioner Karl Benson recalled that the perception around the WAC during Boise State’s BCS-breaking surge was that the Broncos were getting all the calls. It didn’t help that Benson, who served as WAC commissioner from 1994 to 2012, was also a Boise State alum.
The NCAA and conferences formed College Football Officiating, LLC 17 years ago in an effort to place game officials under one umbrella organization, hoping to create more consistent training practices across conferences. The collaboration and involvement of the conference commissioner helped establish replay review and the targeting error, Benson said.
“I think that was important too,” said Benson, who also served as commissioner for the MAC and Sun Belt during his long career. “It showed that there was a need for centralized supervision of football from a security perspective.”
Regionally, there is some division of officials between leagues – for example with the SEC and the Sun Belt, as well as the Big Ten and the MAC. But ultimately, conferences like to have control over who officiates their games.
Benson recalled that Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany wondered why Sun Belt officials worked the 2005 Alamo Bowl between Michigan and Nebraska (still a member of the Big 12 at the time) after that game ended with a chaotic final play involving coaches and players from the Big Ten were involved. the bench entering the field while the ball was still live.
Benson said the power conferences have invested in improving officiating – “But are they getting the results the fans, the media and the coaches want and need?”
Bohl believes there is more consistency in the way the game is played from competition to competition, but there is always room for improvement.
“I know this: We really need good public servants,” Bohl said. “They work very hard. No, they’re not perfect, but they’re going out there to call a perfect game. I don’t believe officials win or lose the game. Certainly the calls have an impact. And I just think that, I believe our officials are working very hard, and I think we should support them.”
That’s good advice for coaches and athletic directors right now.
(Illustration: Meech Robinson for The Athletics; Photos: Scott Taetsch, Aaron M. Sprecher, Brendan Moran / Sportsfile via Getty Images)
