July 23, 2014 at 2:10 p.m.
OT times seven
Dear Reader
We should have known better. But then that’s often the case.
Connie and I had arrived home a little after 10 p.m. Saturday after enjoying an exciting concert at Arts Place. Sally had stayed home, and as we told her what she’d missed — amazing percussion performances and exotic music from the Middle East — she flipped through the channels with the remote control.
“Let’s check this out,” I said as she hit one of the ESPNs. “The score’s tied.”
Happy to oblige if it got her parents to stop yacking about the concert she hadn’t attended, she stopped on the game.
Big mistake.
The University of Arkansas and the University of Kentucky were heading into overtime. And so — it turned out — were we.
College football overtime rules are very different from the NFL’s. There’s no kick-off, and there’s no sudden death.
Instead, each team gets the ball at the 25-yard line and gets a chance to score.
It was, as I recall, 20-20 at the end of regulation play. But after the first overtime, it was 27-27 after a pair of touchdowns and extra points.
“This is getting interesting,” I said.
It got even more interesting after the second overtime. And the third. And the fourth.
Connie’s good sense kicked in somewhere about the fourth or fifth overtime. By now, it was after 11 p.m., time to hit the sack.
But the game wasn’t over.
Each touchdown was matched by another. Each field goal was matched by another. Each two-point conversion was matched by another.
By the fifth overtime, going to sleep without seeing the conclusion of the game was out of the question for both Sally and me. Every few minutes, we’d erupt with shouts of astonishment about another play.
The teams on the field were groggy and exhausted. So were we. But if they weren’t giving up, we weren’t either.
Finally, after a record-tying seven overtimes, Arkansas beat Kentucky. The final score — like something out of a basketball game instead of football — was 71-63.
It was midnight, and the teams had been playing almost five hours.
“Good night,” I said. “You missed a good concert.”
But I had to admit that we’d both seen a great game.[[In-content Ad]]
Connie and I had arrived home a little after 10 p.m. Saturday after enjoying an exciting concert at Arts Place. Sally had stayed home, and as we told her what she’d missed — amazing percussion performances and exotic music from the Middle East — she flipped through the channels with the remote control.
“Let’s check this out,” I said as she hit one of the ESPNs. “The score’s tied.”
Happy to oblige if it got her parents to stop yacking about the concert she hadn’t attended, she stopped on the game.
Big mistake.
The University of Arkansas and the University of Kentucky were heading into overtime. And so — it turned out — were we.
College football overtime rules are very different from the NFL’s. There’s no kick-off, and there’s no sudden death.
Instead, each team gets the ball at the 25-yard line and gets a chance to score.
It was, as I recall, 20-20 at the end of regulation play. But after the first overtime, it was 27-27 after a pair of touchdowns and extra points.
“This is getting interesting,” I said.
It got even more interesting after the second overtime. And the third. And the fourth.
Connie’s good sense kicked in somewhere about the fourth or fifth overtime. By now, it was after 11 p.m., time to hit the sack.
But the game wasn’t over.
Each touchdown was matched by another. Each field goal was matched by another. Each two-point conversion was matched by another.
By the fifth overtime, going to sleep without seeing the conclusion of the game was out of the question for both Sally and me. Every few minutes, we’d erupt with shouts of astonishment about another play.
The teams on the field were groggy and exhausted. So were we. But if they weren’t giving up, we weren’t either.
Finally, after a record-tying seven overtimes, Arkansas beat Kentucky. The final score — like something out of a basketball game instead of football — was 71-63.
It was midnight, and the teams had been playing almost five hours.
“Good night,” I said. “You missed a good concert.”
But I had to admit that we’d both seen a great game.[[In-content Ad]]
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