Did Texas benefit from bad no-call? Rules analyst Matt Austin – and others – thought so

The fourth quarter of Wednesday’s Peach Bowl between Arizona State and Texas was filled with drama — and controversy.

With the game tied, Arizona State had the ball late in the fourth quarter. Facing a third-and-15, the Sun Devils picked up 10 yards on a completion from quarterback Sam Leavitt completed a pass to receiver Melquan Stovall — who remained down after being hit. While the completion was short of a first down, it looked as though the Sun Devils might get a first down on a possible targeting penalty on Texas defensive back Michael Taaffe.

As Stovall was being tended to, ESPN rules analyst Matt Austin discussed the play in question. Austin didn’t explicitly say that it was targeting but strongly hinted at the possibility.

“We definitely have a defenseless receiver and just as he’s turning after catching the ball, he gets hit in the head by the defender,” Austin said. “I would not be surprised if this is called targeting from the booth.”

Despite Austin’s implications that targeting was the likely call, Taaffe’s hit was ruled clean. With that, no penalty was called. that, targeting was not called.

“We definitely have a defenseless receiver and just as he’s turning after catching the ball, he gets hit in the head by the defender. I would not be surprised if this is called targeting from the booth.”

Despite what Matt Austin said, this was NOT called targeting. pic.twitter.com/rAfnDOHMI7

— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 1, 2025

That ruling confused a lot of people. One of those people was NBC rules analyst Terry McAulay, who said it was “Clearly a targeting foul.”

Clearly a targeting foul.

— Terry McAulay (@tjmcaulay) January 1, 2025

Former Michigan standout Jake Butt also struggled to understand the call, saying, “That was textbook targeting- not sure how it wasn’t called.”

There’s two different types of targeting: 1 that focused on the crown or the helmet and one that focuses on defenseless player.

He was a defenseless player on that situation. When a player is “defenseless” no contact to the head and neck area is allowed. That was textbook…

— Jake Butt (@Jbooty88) January 1, 2025

The call ended up looming large. The Sun Devils punted the ball away and while ASU survived a game-winning field goal attempt by Texas kicker Bert Auburn, the Longhorns ultimately prevailed in overtime.

A targeting call would have not only given the Sun Devils a first down but would have put them in Longhorns territory with plenty of time to get into shorter field goal range — or even score a touchdown.

Would Arizona State have won had targeting been called? We can’t say that with certainty of course. But the lack of a call certainly didn’t help.

[Photo Credit: ESPN]