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Teams get adjusted to rules shortening game
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>Updated 9/5/2006 12:16 AM ET
By Steve Wieberg, USA TODAY
College football's rules makers got what they wanted: a faster, shorter game.
Seventeen minutes faster and shorter.
Major-college games played during the season's opening week — employing clock and other changes aimed at picking up the pace — lasted an average of 3 hours, 3 minutes, a notable drop from last year's opening-week average of 3:20.
Thirty-one of the 72 games involving teams in NCAA Division I-A, going into Monday night's Florida State-Miami (Fla.) matchup, were completed in three hours or less. Only four lasted as long as 3½ hours.
A year ago, only five of 52 opening-week games finished in three hours or less. Thirteen went 3½ hours or longer.
It's what the NCAA's football rules committee was looking for when drafting the changes last winter. The clock starts on kickoffs rather than when the receiving team touches the ball and, after a change in possession, restarts as soon as the ball is marked ready for play rather than on the ensuing snap. Kicking tees also were shortened by an inch to limit the number of clock-stopping touchbacks.
Texas Tech coach Mike Leach, whose No. 25-ranked Red Raiders took an even three hours to defeat Southern Methodist 35-3 Saturday, attributed a couple of delay-of-game penalties to the tweaks. "I don't think they're too hard to work around," he said.
But he echoed reservations expressed by a number of coaches heading into the new season. "I just think it's dumb to shorten these games that have been a perfectly good length for years and years," Leach said. "We talk about football, football, football, and we do all we can to have less football."
Indeed, this year's opening games averaged 13 fewer plays than last year's. Teams totaled 101 fewer yards a game, and they scored 4.5 fewer points a game.
The effect was felt, among other places, at Oklahoma, where the Sooners and Alabama at Birmingham ran a combined 110 offensive plays in OU's 24-17 victory. It was one of the lowest totals of the weekend and the lowest for a game involving the Sooners in 50 years.
West Virginia and Marshall got in 123 plays, a little below the first-week average of 126 and well beneath the 2005 opening-week average of almost 139.
"Normally, in most games, you have 12 or 13 possessions. We had 10 on offense," said WVU coach Rich Rodriguez.
"So there's no question there's a (smaller) number of plays and a (smaller) number of possessions. So you've really got to make things happen offensively."
Rodriguez said he called a timeout when the Mountaineers started a possession with about 30 seconds left in the first half so the clock wouldn't start before the ball was snapped.
Pittsburgh coach Dave Wannstedt said his team huddled on the sideline before starting new possessions in a victory against Virginia and then moved immediately to the line of scrimmage and ran the play.
While that was a change for the Panthers, it "was the only adjustment we made," he said.
More teams, however, might have to get used to doing things differently as the season goes on.
"People are very aware of the speed of the game right now," South Florida coach Jim Leavitt said.
Times are changing
Charting the initial impact of rules changes designed to shorten the length of college football games, comparing opening-week games a year ago with this year's (averages are teams' combined):
<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=vaTextBold>Season</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Games</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. time</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. no. of plays</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. total offense</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. scoring</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=6>
</TD></TR><TR><TD class=vaText>2005</TD><TD class=vaText>52</TD><TD class=vaText>3:20</TD><TD class=vaText>139</TD><TD class=vaText>754 yards</TD><TD class=vaText>51.1 points</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=6>
</TD></TR><TR><TD class=vaText>2006</TD><TD class=vaText>72</TD><TD class=vaText>3:03</TD><TD class=vaText>126</TD><TD class=vaText>653 yards</TD><TD class=vaText>46.6 points</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=6>
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Teams get adjusted to rules shortening game
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>Updated 9/5/2006 12:16 AM ET
By Steve Wieberg, USA TODAY
College football's rules makers got what they wanted: a faster, shorter game.
Seventeen minutes faster and shorter.
Major-college games played during the season's opening week — employing clock and other changes aimed at picking up the pace — lasted an average of 3 hours, 3 minutes, a notable drop from last year's opening-week average of 3:20.
Thirty-one of the 72 games involving teams in NCAA Division I-A, going into Monday night's Florida State-Miami (Fla.) matchup, were completed in three hours or less. Only four lasted as long as 3½ hours.
A year ago, only five of 52 opening-week games finished in three hours or less. Thirteen went 3½ hours or longer.
It's what the NCAA's football rules committee was looking for when drafting the changes last winter. The clock starts on kickoffs rather than when the receiving team touches the ball and, after a change in possession, restarts as soon as the ball is marked ready for play rather than on the ensuing snap. Kicking tees also were shortened by an inch to limit the number of clock-stopping touchbacks.
Texas Tech coach Mike Leach, whose No. 25-ranked Red Raiders took an even three hours to defeat Southern Methodist 35-3 Saturday, attributed a couple of delay-of-game penalties to the tweaks. "I don't think they're too hard to work around," he said.
But he echoed reservations expressed by a number of coaches heading into the new season. "I just think it's dumb to shorten these games that have been a perfectly good length for years and years," Leach said. "We talk about football, football, football, and we do all we can to have less football."
Indeed, this year's opening games averaged 13 fewer plays than last year's. Teams totaled 101 fewer yards a game, and they scored 4.5 fewer points a game.
The effect was felt, among other places, at Oklahoma, where the Sooners and Alabama at Birmingham ran a combined 110 offensive plays in OU's 24-17 victory. It was one of the lowest totals of the weekend and the lowest for a game involving the Sooners in 50 years.
West Virginia and Marshall got in 123 plays, a little below the first-week average of 126 and well beneath the 2005 opening-week average of almost 139.
"Normally, in most games, you have 12 or 13 possessions. We had 10 on offense," said WVU coach Rich Rodriguez.
"So there's no question there's a (smaller) number of plays and a (smaller) number of possessions. So you've really got to make things happen offensively."
Rodriguez said he called a timeout when the Mountaineers started a possession with about 30 seconds left in the first half so the clock wouldn't start before the ball was snapped.
Pittsburgh coach Dave Wannstedt said his team huddled on the sideline before starting new possessions in a victory against Virginia and then moved immediately to the line of scrimmage and ran the play.
While that was a change for the Panthers, it "was the only adjustment we made," he said.
More teams, however, might have to get used to doing things differently as the season goes on.
"People are very aware of the speed of the game right now," South Florida coach Jim Leavitt said.
Times are changing
Charting the initial impact of rules changes designed to shorten the length of college football games, comparing opening-week games a year ago with this year's (averages are teams' combined):
<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=vaTextBold>Season</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Games</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. time</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. no. of plays</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. total offense</TD><TD class=vaTextBold>Avg. scoring</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=6>
Longest games
</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
3:38
</TD><TD class=vaText>Iowa State 45, Toledo 43 (3OT)</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
3:35
</TD><TD class=vaText>Southern California 50, Arkansas 14</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
3:31
</TD><TD class=vaText>Oregon 48, Stanford 10</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
Shortest games
</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
2:30
</TD><TD class=vaText>Arkansas State 14, Army 6</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
2:34
</TD><TD class=vaText>Central Florida 35, Villanova 16</TD></TR><TR><TD colSpan=2>
2:36
</TD><TD class=vaText>Minnesota 44, Kent State 0</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>