CCM Top 25: The Injustices By Pac 12 Officials Continues

Every disgruntled football fan on God's green earth has felt as if their team was hosed by the officials at one time or another. Most of the time its due to a missed, or made, call like holding or pass interference that really raises the beef within a fanbase. However, that's not the case for Pac 12 officiating. When these guys mess something up, they mess it up royally. Pac 12 officials have committed more atrocities within the world of college football than all the streakers, stupid banners and flamboyant athletes combined.

Of course Oklahoma fans still aren't over the blatant blown calls that cost them a game against Oregon in 2006. While the officials were arguing over who touched the ball first on an onside kick, it was completely lost to them that Oklahoma running back Allen Patrick actually recovered the kick. Even after review the ball was erroneously awarded to the Ducks who then scored the game winning touchdown. There's no telling how much money was won or lost on that game but you'll never convince the citizens of Sooner Nation that the game wasn't fixed.

Now the Wisconsin Badgers are the next in line to hold a lifetime grudge against the Pac 12 for its incompetent and downright criminal treatment of visiting teams from other conferences. If you missed the conclusion of the game last Saturday night, here's a quick recap. As time was winding down, Wisconsin quarterback Joel Stave took a knee at the Arizona State 13-yard line with just seconds remaining on the clock. The idea was to spike the ball on the next play before bringing in the field goal team to kick a field goal on the game's final play. However, instead all we go was chaos.

Once Stave put the ball down, after taking a knee, the Sun Devils defense jumped on it like a Longhorn cheerleader on a Twinkie and tried their best to treat it as a fumble. The officials stood around acting as if they'd never seen a quarterback take a knee before and to make sure that they had wasted just enough time, they even held the Badger offense off from lining up on the ball for an extra second or two. Wisconsin couldn't even get the snap off to spike the ball because so much time had been wasted by the officiating crew.

On Monday Pac 12 commissioner Larry Scott said that the officiating crew would be reprimanded for the way they handled the situation. "This was an unusual situation to end the game," Scott said. "After a thorough review, we have determined that the officials fell short of the high standard in which Pac-12 games should be managed. We will continue to work with all our officials to ensure this type of situation never occurs again."

Seriously? Scott saying that the Pac 12 has high standards for their officials is like saying that late night cable television is the most family friendly time to sit your kids in front of the tube. Its just ridiculously untrue. At some point you have to stop listening to what people are saying and pay attention to what is actually happening. The fact of the matter is that teams from visiting conferences are notoriously getting hosed by Pac 12 officials.

Its not just fanbases who are holding grudges. Longtime Wisconsin coach and current athletic director Barry Alvarez is resolved to hold a grudge. "That's going to bother me for a long time," Alvarez said on a local radio station on Monday. "I can't wait to see that official again."

We realize here at CCM that our weekly Top 25 doesn't mean beans outside of providing some general college football talking points. However, it appears that we're both resolved to not reward Arizona State for having a game handed to them by the officials. The Sun Devils don't appear in either one of our polls and while Rich moved Wisconsin down five spots following their "loss," I kept them in the same spot from last week.

There's also the legitimate possibility that I dropped Texas A&M lower than they should be (Rich only dropped them four spots to #11) but I strongly feel that the Aggies, while not proving yet to be a Top 5 team, will have plenty of time to work their way back into the Top 10.

Here's our take on how the Top 25 should look after three weeks of college football. As always, please feel free to share your thoughts as well.

CCM Top 25

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