Lane Kiffin finds contrast in discussion of Oregon penalty, fake injuries ‘interesting’

Lane Kiffin finds it “interesting” that Oregon’s substitution penalty is being viewed much differently than another instance of being deceptive.

Oregon captured everyone’s attention with its late-game move against Ohio State. The Ducks intentionally placed 12 defenders on the field. It was an illegal substitution penalty, but the 12th man helped make sure OSU did not have a big play on offense. Most importantly, time came off the clock, and Oregon benefited from the intentional penalty.

Analyst Warren Sharp brought attention to the strategy, highlighting the “genius” move. Urban Meyer used a chess-not-checkers analogy when discussing Lanning’s call.

The praise for Lanning’s move has Kiffin wondering why intentional penalties are being widely accepted as shrewd strategy, but faked injuries to stop the clock and disrupt tempo are criticized.

“It’s interesting, though, I find that all this national talk about someone faking an injury, and people shouldn’t do that. I’m not saying I don’t agree with,” Kiffin said on Wednesday’s SEC teleconference. “But I just found it interesting that everybody thinks this is awesome that you went against the rules and put more people on the field but then everybody’s (up in arms) when faking an injury. So just found it interesting.”

We’re unlikely to see 12 men on the field in late-game situations, as the NCAA has announced that the offended team will now have the option to rest the game clock back to the time displayed at snap.

Andrew Olson

Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.