Bobref

I know he won a state championship at Zionsville in 1987. That was my first state final.

Rick Wimmer was among the best in-game high school football coaches I ever saw. I wonder if I’m the only official who worked games he coached in at all four schools: Zionsville, Merrillville, Greenwood, and Fishers.

I try not to get frustrated. Got to keep in mind that we have new people on the GID from time to time, so when the same old trite arguments — which have been thoroughly debunked time and time again — show up, I just breathe deeply and read on.

The Mercy Rule is not a National Federation Rule, but an IHSAA rule. Commissioner's decision that it will not apply in the upper levels of the tournament.

The Mercy Rule does not apply past the Sectional level.

The Mercy Rule is inapplicable once you get out of the Sectional.

WeBo goes for it on 4th & 5 with the score 34-0, throws for it, and makes it. “Running up the score” posts to commence in 3-2-1 ...

Interesting. Somehow 10 trained observers up in the press box with the benefit of TV monitors and replay also missed it.

The only thing you said on here that makes a lick of sense is that your opinion is only worth 2 cents. And I think you probably have some change coming, at that.

You’re correct.

WeBo 21-0 with 5:09 in 2nd.

All I can say is I’m glad they didn’t have all these observers back when I was working the finals. It’s brutal up here!

DT, you hit the nail on the head. I attended Valpo’s game against Dwenger, and came away thinking they had no chance against New Pal because their pass offense was dreadful — they’d never be able to score enough the keep up with the Dragons. In this game, their QB actually threw the ball much better than he had against BD! Still, if they had a passing attack that was on par with their defense, running game, and special teams, they might well be celebrating a state championship today.

Nobody likes holding calls. But we dissected every one of them, along with every other foul called. All were there. The only glitch was a block in the back call by the line judge on an interception return. It was not a block in the back ... but it was an illegal blindside block. The mis-call benefited the intercepting team by 5 yds. An error, but in the grand scheme of things, of little consequence.

I hope you’re not implying the officiating crew for this game was anything less than stellar. I was the IHSAA observer assigned to this game. Best officiated game I’ve seen all year. I was on the field the first half, and in the press box with 9 other observers for the second half. We all agreed the crew turned in a state championship level performance.

I think, to sum it up, the better team won a hard fought game. No surprise there. The surprise, to many people, was that in the end Valpo was better than most people thought. A 7 pt. margin was an accurate reflection of the difference between the two teams.

Ummm ... no. I second that.

Valpo hanging tough, keeping New Pal’s offense off the field. 10-10 and Valpo gets the ball to start the 2nd half. A 17 play drive using up almost 8 minutes. Spiegel not a factor so far.

News Flash. The IHSAA has overruled CC’s win and awarded the championship to Lutheran because multiple CC players were detected wearing illegal eye black.

Agreed.

Wow! 6 whole posts in your GID career and already a rating of -3. It’s clear somebody doesn’t understand something. Thanks for enlightening us, since this is a topic that’s never been discussed on the GID before. 😉

It’s an interesting philosophical question. I answered it that way because I know how I would feel if I were second guessed on the basis of video evidence of that quality. The Line Judge had absolutely the best view of anyone in the entire stadium on that play. As a semistate level official, I am not inclined to second guess him on the strength of a press box level video. Hence my invocation of the “incontrovertible video evidence” standard. At the NFL or D-1 levels, however, where the video replay capabilities are far better, I can tell you based on my conversations with actual replay officials, the standard is quite different. Regardless of what they say, if the replay official thinks he had a better look at the play than the on-field official, he’s going to make what he thinks is the right call. The bottom line is, should be, and always will be “get the call right.”

And ... another case of sour grapes.

If you can let me know approximately when this occurred during the game, I’d like to take a look at the video.

I watched the video of the onside kick, probably 25 times. If I were a replay official, the call on the field would stand because there is not “incontrovertible video evidence” to overturn it. But, because I have been accused - inaccurately - of being an apologist for officials, I will say this was a poorly officiated play. There were a number of errors made on the play, none of which had any bearing on the call, but which are troublesome nonetheless. First, and most egregious, the crew failed to react to what was an obvious impending onside kick. In that circumstance, the manual clearly calls for the crew to assume the “obvious short kick formation.” Instead of one official at the kickers’ 40 yd. line on the chains sideline and one on the press box sideline at the 50, as is usually the case, the Linesman and the Umpire move up, so that there is an official stationed at both the K 40 and at midfield on each sideline. This is a potentially disastrous mistake which would have earned a significant downgrade during an evaluation. Fortunately, the onside kick went directly to the Line Judge stationed at midfield, so the error did not come into play. On any kickoff, and especially when an onside kick is a possibility, the “up” officials start the play with beanbag in hand, so they are ready to mark a spot of first touching. Neither the Back Judge on the 50 nor the Line Judge at the 40 did so, which led to... The Line Judge, instead of marking the spot of first touching with his beanbag, dropped a flag instead. He then gave Signal 16, hands on both shoulders, which is the correct signal for first touching ... except when it is accompanied by a flag, in which case it signals the foul “illegal touching,” which this clearly was not. This led to confusion in reporting the situation to the Referee, with the result that nobody knew what was going on for a significant amount of time. I would have suggested that the proper sequence of signals, all by the Line Judge, should have been (1) beanbag at the spot of first touching, (2) kill the clock when the ball was possessed by Andrean, (3) signal “first touching,” pointing to the spot of the touching, and (4) point an Eastbrook recovery, since there was no question that Eastbrook would elect to take the ball at the spot of first touching. Bottom line, a poorly officiated play, but IMO, insufficient evidence to say it was the wrong call.