‘I don’t know what targeting is’: Did a non-call cost Arizona State a playoff game?

ATLANTA — It’s rough for any game, any season to come down to a penalty flag. But it’s arguably rougher when a season turns on a penalty flag that wasn’t thrown.

Texas’ 39-31 win over Arizona State in double overtime at the Peach Bowl on New Year’s Day was an instant classic, by far the best game of the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff and one of the best games of the year by any measure. Left for dead after going down two touchdowns early, Arizona State stomped its way back into the fight, tying the game at 24 with just over five minutes remaining.

And then, after a missed Texas field goal attempt, Arizona State had the chance to nab an improbable victory right out from under the Longhorns. With less than 90 seconds remaining, the Sun Devils were on the move, and quarterback Sam Leavitt found Melquan Stovall across the middle for a 10-yard gain to midfield.

Texas safety Michael Taaffe met Stovall at the logo, laying out Stovall on the ASU 48 with a cracking hit. Helmets collided, leaving Stovall prone on the field for several minutes. The assumption in the stadium and on screens nationwide was that this would be flagged as targeting, and Arizona State would move up to the Texas 37 with just over a minute remaining in the game. An upset was at hand!

Only … there was no flag. Officials in the booth decided that Taaffe wasn’t guilty of targeting, and Arizona State, facing fourth-and-5 at midfield, punted the ball away. Another missed Texas field goal gave Arizona State a chance in overtime, but blown coverage on two straight plays, and a Leavitt interception, doomed the Sun Devils’ hopes for an epochal upset.

So, attention turned back to that targeting call, and the promise of an upset that vanished to wherever netherworld the flag was already in. Was the play targeting? Here’s the play, in slow motion, for you to judge:

The first part of Taaffe that contacts Stovall is the helmet, which would seem to be a textbook case of targeting. But nobody involved in college football reads textbooks anymore, do they?

Being as generous as humanly possible here, you could argue that Taaffe 1) did not launch himself into Stovall and 2) did not lead with the crown of his helmet, which are the two elements involved in targeting. So, from a pedantic standpoint, this would appear to be a case of adhering to the letter rather than the spirit of the law — breaking down the precise trajectories involved and determining that they do not meet the literal definition of “targeting,” rather than observing that, you know, Taaffe’s helmet made Stovall’s helmet snap backward.

Was this a case of the referees basically swallowing their whistles and letting the game play out blood and all, like the final minutes of an NBA playoff game? Perhaps, but even the NBA will call a foul if a player hurls another one into the fifth row. (Unless it’s LeBron doing the hurling.) There are, and should be, limits to let ‘em play, ref, and this sure seemed like it surpassed those limits.

“I’m going to be honest, I don’t know what targeting is,” a clearly frustrated Arizona State head coach Kenny Dillingham said after the game. “We lost one of our best players in the first half for targeting, and I just don’t — I just don’t know what it is. So I don’t want to comment on something that I have to get a better grasp of what it is.”

Dillingham was referring to defensive back Shamari Simmons, who was ejected from the Big 12 championship and forced to sit out the first half of the Peach Bowl for this helmet-to-helmet hit:

Simmons would have a significant impact on the Peach Bowl; he was the player who tackled Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers for a crucial third-quarter safety.

“So I don’t want to comment on something,” Dillingham concluded, “that I have to get a better grasp of what it is.” That was a deft sidestep from the Arizona State coach, and it’s highly likely he’s had plenty of choice comments outside of media earshot. But none of those add a single point onto the scoreboard.

Worth noting: There’s absolutely no guarantee Arizona State would have won the game even with the targeting call. The Sun Devils struggled with field goals all season long, with three different kickers converting only 11 of 20 on the year.

For the Peach Bowl, Dillingham went with Carston Kieffer, who only converted his first field goal of the entire season at the Big 12 championship last month. He was 2 of 3 on the day already, and would have been facing as much as a 52-yard kick to win the game. That’s a hell of a lot of pressure to put on a redshirt freshman.

Still, Arizona State should have gotten the chance … or at least understood why it didn’t. Targeting is a necessary penalty to protect the safety of players on both sides of the ball. But officials have a responsibility to communicate its parameters, call it correctly, and ensure that both coaches and players understand the rule. Too much is at stake, both with safety and with the game, to leave it up for this much debate.