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The Sucker Punch Heard Around The World | What You May Have Missed With The Miami Beach Bowl

The first annual Miami Beach Bowl was a fantastic game that was followed by a vicious brawl.

By M. Hofeld
Rob Foldy/Getty Images

Kai Nacua became an internet sensation immediately following the Miami Beach Bowl but it was for all the wrong reasons. Shortly after a DaShaughn Terry intercepted BYU quarterback Christian Stewart to seal a double-overtime 55-48 win for Memphis, a scrum between the two teams broke out.

While restraint should have been showed by both parties it appears that the squab started with an untimely celebration by a Memphis player in the face of several BYU guys and an unfortunate shove by a Cougars' player.

Now, this is where our man Kai Nacua comes in. As the melee was getting broken up, Memphis tight end Alan Cross was being restrained by a member of the coaching staff when Nacua delivered the infamous sucker punch.

The punch was both a cheap shot and cowardly. Notice that he's taking the second swing as he's running away...which is the reason why he wifs. This is because his attempt to fight someone face-to-face resulted in him having a nasty shiner and nearly getting knocked out.

First of all the #1 rule of a football fight is to not take your helmet off. Secondly, how else is a guy supposed to prove that he's tough when he can't win a fight face-to-face? A cheap shot was the only course of action that Nacua had left because it wasn't apparent that he wasn't going to win a straight up fight.

The tragedy in all of this is that while the internet world is clowning on a thug move by a BYU player the best bowl game that has been played yet has been overshadowed. Tuesday will bring about two more games and the turnaround season by Memphis that was capped with a fourth quarter rally and double-overtime bowl win has been overshadowed by a bunch of fools that don't know how to control themselves. It shouldn't be a fight that we're talking about. It should be plays like this.

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