It appears that the referee who flat out tackled South Carolina quarterback Stephen Garcia in LSU’s 24-17 win on Saturday night won’t face any discipline from the NC-two-A.
The league’s coordinator of football officials, Rogers Redding, reviewed the tape and considered the hit to be inadvertent contact, SEC spokesman Charles Bloom said.
Bloom said the umpire position lends itself to more contact than is seen with other on-field officials. “We feel there was nothing else that needs to be read into it and it was a collision between a player and an official,” Bloom said.
Hackett won’t face any discipline for what the league considers protecting himself from an onrushing player, Bloom said.
Neither of the coaches, LSU’s Les Miles or South Carolina’s Steve Spurrier, thought Hackett did anything wrong.
Spurrier thought Hackett was trying to get out of Garcia’s way. “Stephen sort of cut back right into him. Sometimes that will happen,” the coach said.
Miles, always coaching them up, couldn’t help critiquing Hackett’s technique.
“We told him, ‘Listen, you’ve got to use your flipper. You’ve got to use your forearm. But then you have to wrap up.’ I want you to know that we were disappointed in his effort to be honest with you,” said Miles, a smile on his face as reporters laughed Monday.
Getting serious, Miles said Hackett reacted instinctively to protect himself once Garcia turned his way.
“Certainly, everybody in this room would look to defend themselves, and I’m certain that’s what he was thinking,” Miles said.
The situation is over and dead (especially considering Spurrier even said the ref was defending himself), but this still looks like a full-on tackle to me:
