Rules+: Referees Earning Our Stripes

Listen if you dare to three scenarios in which "routine" plays blew up and tested the officiating crew to handle suddenly challenging rulings: plays involving illegal touching of a punt, a spike play to stop the clock, and a fake punt that didn't fake out the officiating crew.

Trick plays are tricky enough to handle correctly, but how about "routine" plays that blow up and test our mechanics and rules knowledge? In this episode I cover three challenging scenarios during try downs and two plays from college games that may have ripple effects the rest of the season: the late substitution foul by Oregon against Ohio State and the successful onside kick by South Carolina against Alabama executed by using a drop kick.

I continue to share important clarifications and observations from NCAA rules secretary Steve Shaw in his weekly video reviews and bulletins. In this episode I discuss the swinging gate and other trick plays as well as late-game scenarios that can present tricky situations as well.

Now that the curtain has raised on the 2024 season, NCAA rules editor Steve Shaw has already issued important bulletin clarifications, including a new provision concerning a perceived loophole in the 10-second-runoff protocol. Keep up with the latest interpretations and clarifications as the Rules+ podcast monitors CFO weekly updates.

In this episode I take one more peek behind the curtain of the college football replay booth to look at guidelines from the NCAA Replay Case Book for judging four more play situations: when a ball carrier is down, when a ball carrier is out of bounds, when a safety or touchback has occurred, and when indicators of targeting are present.

We don't have replay during Texas high school football games, but we can peek behind the curtain of the replay booth for college games by consulting the NCAA Replay Casebook. In this episode, I pull back the curtain for guidelines in ruling on fumbles, plays at the goal line and pylon, blocks by the kicking team during an onside kick, and forward vs. backward passes.

Complete your pre-season rules-study preparation with this episode's review of the oft-neglected editorial changes and points of emphasis for 2024. See how 7 of the 20 editorial changes listed on FR-6 will impact how we do business this season.

This episode wraps up our pre-season preparation based on the 12 chapters of The Rogers Redding Study Guide to NCAA Football Rules as chapter 12 addresses a few "loose ends and other stuff" about situations we may not see often but that we would like to be able to handle if they do occur, including inadvertent whistles, down counting errors, and myths about muffing a loose ball.

As the Rules+ pre-season tour of The Rogers Redding Study Guide to NCAA Football Rules enters the home stretch, this episode reviews the guidelines in chapter 11 for penalty enforcement, including discussion of the philosophy and procedures for applying the 3-and-1 principle based on the basic spot and on the postscrimmage kick spot.

There's no substitute for understanding the NCAA football substitution process than the coverage in this episode of chapter 10 in The Rogers Redding Study Guide to NCAA Football Rules, the 10th episode in a series of 12 episodes reviewing the 12 chapters of the Redding guide.