Conspiracy theorists had their smoking gun in the fourth quarter of the Dallas Cowboys-Detroit Lions playoff game on Sunday.
You very rarely see an officiating crew pick up a flag as late as the Cowboys-Lions crew did on the most controversial play of wild-card weekend. On third down, Matthew Stafford threw to Brandon Pettigrew, who was covered by Cowboys linebacker Anthony Hitchens. Hitchens never turned around, face-guarding Pettigrew, and that combined with some contact drew a flag for pass interference.
But the Lions went from thinking they had a crucial first down to facing a fourth and 1. The officials reversed the call, saying Hitchens made a clean play. The Lions tried to draw the Cowboys offsides, took a delay of game penalty, shanked a punt, and the Cowboys marched down for a go-ahead touchdown with 2:32 remaining. The call changed the entire game. Most NFL fans hate the Cowboys, and did they ever hate that the pass interference wasn't called.
Mike Pereira, the well-respected former vice president of officiating in the NFL, was in the booth for Fox’s broadcast and said he thought it was pass interference and wrong of the officials to reverse the call. That seemed to be the consensus opinion of most fans watching as well. No matter what the call should have been, it went against the Lions and will be a topic of conversation for a long time.
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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdowncorner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @YahooSchwab
from Yahoo Sports http://ift.tt/1DmkLsf
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