Oklahoma State nearly squandered a come-from-behind victory Saturday due to a chaotic sequence after rallying from an early deficit against Arkansas. The Cowboys ultimately won in double overtime, but the final moments of regulation were filled with drama. With the game tied 31-31 late in the fourth quarter, Oklahoma State was driving and faced a fourth-and-4 from the Razorbacks’ 15-yard line.
The Cowboys’ offense appeared ready to go for it but was flagged for a false start after a tight end went in motion, causing an Arkansas defender to jump. Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy criticized the SEC officiating crew during his postgame press conference and demanded more consistency in rule enforcement across conferences.
“So, when we go on two and we clap and then clap again, we motioned the tight end over the run the ball over here, they jumped,” Gundy said, via GoPokes247. “And the explanation to me was, ‘You can’t do that.’ But we’ve done it before. So there’s the issue you have with officiating crews. That’s an SEC crew. We’ve done it before; we did it all preseason in scrimmages with Big 12 crews and it didn’t get called. So Steve Shaw’s the (college football) head of officiating and he needs to fix it. He needs to get them all in one room and have everybody have the same (rules). That’s the way I see it.”
The false start call pushed Oklahoma State back to a fourth-and-9. Kicker Logan Ward hit the 38-yard field goal to make it 31-28 with 55 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter. But Gundy also took issue with how the officials handled the clock for the stoppage as a result of the penalty.
Well, I was just telling them they were wrong,” Gundy said. “Was there not 1:47 before the ball was snapped (on the previous play)? I looked at the clock, and I saw 1:47 because in my brain, I was doing (math of) a four- to five-second play and a 40-second runoff, call timeout and deal with it after that. So I saw 1:47 and they messed something up — I’m not sure what they messed up; I don’t really care – but all I know is they gave us a three-second play on a 9-yard run, correct? I mean, what’d he get? Eight or nine yards? And that’s where I had an issue with it.
“They said when the ball was blown dead after the play (it was) three seconds after the snap,” Gundy continued. “There’s no way. Maybe it was; I’ve been wrong before, but I’m going to guess it was a six-second play before he went down. Because not only did that happen, (but) they were pushing and shoving. So my argument to them was, ‘OK, I’m good that you’re going to restart the 40 (second play clock), but it wasn’t 1:43, it should be about 1:39.’ And here’s what’s interesting about football — they said, ‘Coach, it’s only three seconds anyway.’ And I said, ‘Every second counts.’ Do you realize how many seconds there were when they tied the game? Two. I’m just saying, they said, ‘OK, well every second counts? Well, it’s only three seconds, coach.’ There was two left. Worked out, but it is what it is.”
Arkansas got the ball back with 55 seconds left in the fourth quarter and went 48 yards in nine plays to set up the game-tying 45-yard field goal by Kyle Ramsey. Both teams missed field goal attempts in the first overtime before Oklahoma State running back Ollie Gordon scored the game-winning touchdown on a 12-yard run. The Cowboys defense came up with a game-sealing stop on fourth-and-1 in the second overtime.
“In my opinion, they need to have all officiating crews in one room going over the rules, so we don’t have issues like that,” Gundy said. “There’s always a debate. We scored a touchdown. They called it an illegal (chop block) on a guy blocking back on a guy that’s setting the edge here and he hits him in the side. But sometimes they say it’s legal; sometimes they say it’s not.
Either way, it doesn’t make a difference to me; just make a decision and we’ll go one way or the other. We had the discussion before the game about it — we talked to three officials, and we told them exactly what we were going to do and they said it was good. Obviously, we didn’t talk to enough of them because somebody called.”
