MAC appeals Michigan-Western Michigan result, asks NCAA and CFP to recognize Broncos as winner
KALAMAZOO, Mich. — After review, the Mid-American Conference wants Western Michigan recognized as having defeated Michigan after all.
Citing what it believes to be an “extraordinary” circumstance, the MAC appealed the outcome of the Michigan-Western Michigan game Tuesday and asked NCAA and College Football Playoff administrators to recognize the Broncos as the actual winner. The CFP is a particularly notable request since its bracket selection choices in December carry significant financial benefits to teams that make the playoff.
Michigan won 13-12 on a Hail Mary pass Saturday night. The replay official had put one second back on the clock after Bryce Underwood’s first Hail Mary try was incomplete.
An NBC replay showed a clock expiring before the ball hit the ground or any player, and Terry McCaulay — the rules analyst on the broadcast — said that was a synced version of the stadium clock.
Later, the Big Ten said the call was correct and published a recording of the replay as it was reviewed by officials. The conference said it too used a shot of the game clock in the stadium, which showed 1 second remaining when the ball was touched by a player, WMU’s Micah Davis. Since Davis had just been out of bounds, the clock would stop on such contact.
In his letter to the FBS Oversight Committee, MAC Commissioner Jon Steinbrecher said “established protocol” in this situation is the television truck is contacted with a request to insert the in-stadium game clock onto “the program feed” — and that is supposed be the sole source of the replay decision.
“Had the prescribed protocol been followed and the program-feed clock been used, no additional time would have been restored, no additional play would have been awarded, and Western Michigan would have won the game 12-7,” Steinbrecher wrote.
The controversy was the talk of college football on the long holiday weekend with many questions surrounding how the officiating crew decided to put the second back on the clock and give Michigan one more try at the win. The MAC initially accepted the explanation, but that had changed by Tuesday.
“After further study and investigation, it is now evident that replay protocol was not properly followed in determining whether time remained on the game clock at the conclusion of the Western Michigan vs. Michigan football game,” Steinbrecher said.
Michigan spokesman David Ablauf had no comment on the appeal other than, “The Big Ten handles all replay reviews and discussion. We don’t have any involvement in replay as an institution.”
Messages seeking comment were sent to the NCAA, CFP and Big Ten. Game results are rarely, if ever, changed after the fact unless the NCAA throws out or vacates results because of rules infractions, though there are countless examples of questionable decisions by officiating crews affecting the outcome (Colorado beating Missouri on a fifth down in 1990 is familiar to many).
Western Michigan was voted as the preseason favorite in the MAC, and that would suggest that the possibility certainly exists for it to factor into the CFP rankings. The highest-ranked team from the American, Conference USA, MAC, Mountain West, Pac-12 or Sun Belt gets an automatic bid into the playoff.
Michigan was ranked No. 16 in the preseason AP Top 25 poll but dropped out of the rankings Tuesday.
“I recognize that the oversight committee does not ordinarily alter results recorded on the field,” Steinbrecher said. "Nevertheless, the circumstances of this game are extraordinary. ... Western Michigan should not be disadvantaged because the prescribed replay protocol was not followed and an unsynchronized clock was used to award a play that, under the applicable procedure, should not have occurred.”
