SEC Coordinator of Officials reveals major takeaways from controversial Tennessee-Ole Miss game

SEC officials who were assigned the return of Lane Kiffin to Knoxville knew the showdown between Ole Miss and Tennessee was going to draw a rowdy crowd, but nobody ever imagined golf balls raining down from the sky.

During SEC Media Days, John McDaid — the SEC Coordinator of Officials — took the podium to reveal the major takeaways he had regarding the way the controversial game was officiated.

“It’s a reminder to our officials that we’re there to get a game completed,” stated McDaid. “We had a long suspension of play in that game, for the correct reasons. We needed to suspend the game. Just a reminder of our officials, we don’t have the authority to end a game. To terminate a game. To decide an outcome before we play all 60 minutes.

But at the same time, and you alluded to this in your question, we need to do something that recognizes what is the safest thing for the teams when we have an unusual circumstance. We don’t get to practice that a lot. Thankfully. Weather delays sometimes create the same situation. But for different reasons.”

Evidently, McDavid believes the crew on-sight in Knoxville did a good job of handling the anarchy. To illustrate, fans in Knoxville didn’t take kindly to the call that resulted in a turnover for the Volunteers, and retaliated by throwing trash on the field.

The chaos resulted in a 20-minute delay, as Tennessee cheerleaders headed to the locker room. Even after play resumed, there was still trash being thrown on the field.

During the anarchy, Kiffin was hit with a golf ball, which he turned into a fiery speech for his Rebels squad.

“They were just throwing stuff and I said ‘Put your helmet on and let’s play,’” Kiffin said. “It is what it is, there are 100,000 people that came out and they’re passionate. It didn’t go the way they wanted.”

Ole Miss would leave Knoxville with a victory, but McDavid believes officials learned a valuable lesson that fateful night.

“Those are the two main takeaways, that if there’s a safety issue, we need to get the teams to a safe part of the field, or maybe off the field,” stated McDaid. “We had a similar situation, not as protracted, but we had a situation that was not unlike what happened in Knoxville that night at the Vanderbilt-Colorado Springs game earlier in the season. The second takeaway is, and this applies to weather delays as well, as officials we need to work with the teams, work around, manage the issue.

“A lot of times you’re coming back from those kind of delays, there’s a lot of concern on the coaching staff to make sure you have appropriate warm up periods. The key idea that I ask my officials, my crew chiefs to exercise is mutual agreement. How long are we going to allow them to warm up after the delay? Let’s get mutual agreement between the coaches. It usually works just fine.”

While it was a wild scene in Knoxville last fall, the John McDaid and all SEC officials learned some valuable lessons — and Lane Kiffin got a free golf ball out of the entire ordeal.