One last look at the final play of BYU's incredible win over Notre Dame

There was some controversy over the last play of the BYU-Notre Dame game this past Saturday night. The two big issues were the time on the game clock and the contact between Notre Dame wide Receiver Jaden Greathouse and BYU cornerback Evan Johnson. While BYU is on to UCF and Notre Dame is on to Navy, here’s a look at the end of their epic battle.

Game clock mismanagement

The clock on the final play of the game was mismanaged. It was done in a way that hurt both teams and hurt the great game between the two of them. After looking at it a ton, it does show that 0:01 remained on the clock after CJ Carr's final pass fell incomplete. I've also seen breakdowns of the game clock starting late after Notre Dame snapped the ball on the final play.  Notre Dame fans are correct to point out that 0:01 remained, and BYU fans are correct to point out the game clock starting late on the same play. When broken down, the play clearly takes four seconds but four seconds don’t come off the game clock.

It's a blemish on the game, but it's not one that invalidates the final score. If the officials had reviewed the play and said it was 0:00 when it was 0:01, that would be a much bigger problem. It would be in the vein of UM-Western Michigan in Week 1 of this season. There are clearly clock problems across college football this year. The Big 12 handled it much better than the Big Ten did, though. Acknowledging that a mistake occurred instead of just sweeping it under the rug to protect one of its top teams. It's also worth looking into that: when games get below one minute, maybe they need to have tenths of a second on them (0:01.1), as they do in college basketball.

Contact in the secondary

BYU’s defense played a great game against a very good Notre Dame offense. The question as to whether or not there was pass interference on the same final play is similar. Again, both teams have arguments in their favor. This was just the final of a game-long pattern of poor officiating in contact between receivers and defensive backs. If you want the contact from Johnson to be considered on this play, then the contact from and initiated by Greathouse needs to be too. There were earlier plays in the game where BYU defenders were literally thrown to the ground and had flags called on them. There was also a phantom offensive PI called on BYU on a play that would have made the game 28-10 Cougars. The calls were not good, but they weren't strictly for one team or another and didn't decide the game.

I’ve seen plays like this happen for a few years now with no flag being thrown, so I’m starting to get numb to anything less egregious than this. The battling between Evan Johnson and Jaden Greathouse was much, much less. But again, maybe I’m getting numb. After all, on the same Saturday, I saw this result in a no-call.

So did this.

Maybe this AI-edited picture of the final one tells the story the most. The point remains that officiating is far from perfect and was far from perfect in the 28-24 BYU victory over Notre Dame. It can be improved and should be. But it doesn’t invalidate or take away from a fantastic game between two great teams.

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