Lincoln Riley Says Big 10 Admitted They Had No Evidence To Overturn Goalline Call

Lincoln Riley is justifiably upset with the Big Ten Conference and how their referees and replay room handled the end of the Minnesota Golden Gophers‘ 24-17 win over the USC Trojans.

With just under a minute remaining in the fourth quarter in a 17-17 tie, Minnesota faced a 4th and goal from the half-yard line. Minnesota quarterback Max Brosmer kept the ball on a quarterback sneak, and dove towards the end zone. Referees on the field ruled that he’d been stopped short, and the play immediately went to replay review. 

Replays were inconclusive; from every available angle, it’s impossible to see where the ball is when Brosmer’s helmet reaches its furthest point forward. The mass of lineman piled up in the middle of the field completely obscure where the ball is in relation to goal line.

The Big Ten refs overturned it anyway.

It was confusing to say the least, considering the NCAA standard of “indisputable video evidence” necessary to overturn the call on the field. It was made even more confusing considering an alternate angle of the play showed that Brosmer lost control of the ball during the play. Which was then subsequently recovered by USC.

Riley and USC asked for an explanation from the conference, and as has become common with the Big Ten, received an unsatisfactory answer.

USC Trojans head coach Lincoln Riley to a penalty on the sideline . (Darren Yamashita-USA TODAY Sports)

Big Ten Conference Is An Officiating Mess

In a post-practice media scrum on Tuesday, Riley told reporters that the conference agreed that they had no indisputable evidence to overturn the call. 

“They agree that it’s not indisputable,” Riley said. “I mean, they agree, which is unfortunate because that’s part of the rules. But listen — I get it’s a close play. I get it. Did he score? Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. I don’t know. But that’s the problem, nobody knows, and you’re going to have to go back with what the officials call on the field.”

“They thought the runner had scored,” Riley continued. “And they felt like that was enough to overturn it. I have not been given any explanation why we ignored the part of the rule that obviously states that to overturn something, it has to be absolutely, completely clear-cut. There can be no doubt about what happens. That part was ignored, which is unfortunate for us.”

“It’s not the reason we lost the game,” he said. “We had plenty of other opportunities, and I’m not sitting here blaming the officials, saying well, they did a bad job, and that’s why we didn’t win the game. That had nothing to do with it.”

Riley’s right; that call isn’t the reason the Trojans lost. USC played a sloppy, mistake-filled game. The outcome shouldn’t have come down to a goal line play against an outmanned Minnesota team. But it is yet another example of the extremely poor officiating we’ve seen from the newly expanded Big Ten Conference in 2024.

Minnesota themselves were the victims of a terrible missed call on an onside kick attempt against the Michigan Wolverines. Michigan also benefited from several missed face masks and obvious holding penalties in their game against USC. For conference officials to tell Riley that there was no indisputable evidence to justify overturning a monumental call though, is simply inexcusable.

The standard for replay review isn’t “we think he probably got in, and P.J. Fleck is really mad, so…” It’s that there must be obvious, 100% conclusive evidence that the call on the field is incorrect. If you don’t like that standard, change it. But until then, you can’t have conferences and officials make up their own rules on the fly whenever they feel like it. That’s exactly what the Big Ten just did…and admitted they did.