Georgia received clarification from the SEC on a couple of controversial officiating calls made in this past Saturday’s loss to South Carolina.
The league office essentially confirmed the correct ruling was made when quarterback Hutson Mason was flagged for grounding on a first-and-goal pass play with five minutes left in the game. Georgia coach Mark Richt declined to share the league’s thoughts on a holding call against Brandon Kublanow that negated a 54-yard touchdown run by Todd Gurley late in the first quarter. However, sources familiar with the communications between the two parties indicate that there should have been no penalty on the play.
Of course, none of that will do anything to change the outcome of the game, a 38-35 loss by the Bulldogs (1-1, 0-1 SEC).
“I don’t know how much detail I’m supposed to give on these kinds of things,” Richt said during his weekly news conference on Tuesday. “I will say on the grounding call, they say … if the ball has a reasonable chance of being caught, whether or whether not a defender deflects it or not, it would not be grounding. But they think the ball, as it was being delivered, had no reasonable chance of being caught.”
On first-and-goal at the South Carolina 4, with 5:24 remaining and Georgia trailing by three, quarterback Hutson Mason faked a toss sweep left to Todd Gurley, then rolled right with the intention throwing a pass to H-back Quayvon Hicks, who was running a flat route to the right. But Gamecocks defensive lineman Gerald Dixon sniffed it out and pressured Mason. Mason threw the ball low directly at Dixon. It glanced low off the South Carolina defender and into the line of scrimmage.
Georgia lost 10 yards by penalty on the play plus the down. Three plays later, kicker Marshall Morgan missed the potential game-tying field goal from 28 yards out.
As for the other calls Richt asked for clarification on, he said “The rest of them, I’m not going to get into.
“I’ll say this about (SEC coordinator of officials) Steve Shaw: He’ll shoot you straight and he’ll say exactly what he thought. Many times he’ll say, ‘I don’t know if this was a quality call.’ … If there’s an explanation needed, he’s always there.”
Georgia had the ball on second-and-four at its own 46 with just over a minute left in the first half when Gurley busted through the right side of the line for an apparent 54-yard touchdown. But Kublanow, the left guard, was flagged for holding his man. Richt said the Bulldogs’ game tape showed that the defender tripped and fell and was not “taken down” by the offensive lineman as it originally appeared.
“I think the officials have a very difficult job,” Richt said. “… Rarely does everybody say ‘great call.’ Anytime something bad happens, that team’s mad or (the other) team’s mad. Somebody’s not going to like the call. … But there is accountability and it’s within the league.”
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