The San Francisco 49ers woke up on Monday still stinging from a Super Bowl loss and facing criticism given that some of their players admitted they were not aware of playoff overtime rules that allowed for both teams to possess the ball.
Sunday’s Super Bowl in Las Vegas was only the second to go to into overtime and the first to fall under a March 2022 rule change that eliminated the chance of a team winning the game outright on the first possession of the extra period with a touchdown.
“I didn’t even know about the new playoff overtime rule, so it was a surprise to me,” 49ers defensive lineman Arik Armstead said after the game. “I didn’t even really know what was going on in terms of that.”
Photo: AP
After winning the overtime coin toss, the 49ers elected to receive the ball to start the extra frame and marched down the field before settling for a 27-yard field goal and a 22-19 lead over the Kansas City Chiefs.
However, the Chiefs responded with a 75-yard drive that Patrick Mahomes capped with a three-yard touchdown pass to Mecole Hardman, which secured a 25-22 victory.
In the regular season, if the team that gets the ball first in overtime scores a touchdown on the opening possession, they win.
“You know what? I didn’t even realize the playoff rules were different in overtime. I assume you just want the ball to score a touchdown and win,” 49ers fullback Kyle Juszczyk said in an ESPN report.
“I guess that’s not the case. I don’t totally know the strategy there. We hadn’t talked about it, no,” he said.
The NFL’s overtime rules came under scrutiny in January 2022 after the Buffalo Bills’ high-powered offense never got a chance to touch the ball in the extra period of their crushing playoff loss to the Chiefs.
At the time, if a team kicked a field goal on the first possession of overtime, their opponent got a possession and could win the game with a touchdown or tie it with a field goal. If both teams got field goals, then the next team to score would win.
San Francisco head coach Kyle Shanahan said that he and his analytics team discussed overtime possibilities ahead of the Super Bowl.
Members of the Chiefs, including head coach Andy Reid, said after the game that their analytics showed it was better to kick off in overtime so that if both teams matched and scored, they would have a chance to win outright on the next possession.
“He’s a pretty smart guy, so there’s gotta be a reason why he” chose to receive the ball first, Reid said of Shanahan.
“Everybody’s got their own philosophy on it. I don’t know if there’s a right or wrong; we felt that you [should] kick off first, but that’s neither here nor there. That’s what we think, but, listen, the guy’s a great football coach.”
Brice Turang and Pete Crow-Armstrong’s consecutive RBI singles proved to be the difference in the US’ 5-3 win over Canada in a World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarterfinal on Friday night in Houston. The US faces the Dominican Republic, which crushed South Korea 10-0 in seven innings in its quarter-final, in a semifinal Sunday in Miami for a spot in Tuesday’s championship. The Dominican team has won all five games in this WBC by a combined margin of 51-10. It appeared the US squad was headed toward a cozy victory when it built a 5-0 lead by the sixth inning. A first-inning RBI groundout
Wilyer Abreu watched the ball leave the park and tossed his bat high in the air. His Venezuela teammates streamed out of the dugout in celebration. The comeback was on and the win over the reigning World Baseball Classic (WBC) champion Japan was within reach. Japan, their 11-game WBC winning streak on the line, held a 5-4 lead in the sixth inning of Saturday’s thrilling quarter-final matchup when Abreu put his team ahead with the biggest swing of the game: a three-run shot off Hiromi Itoh that sent the loanDepot Park crowd into a passionate roar and helped seize Venezuela’s 8-5
A BREATHLESS BATTLE: France clinched the championship in a vicious back-and-forth match with England, denying Ireland the title by just a few points France won back-to-back Six Nations titles after beating England 48-46 on a last-second penalty-kick by Thomas Ramos in a thriller for the ages on Saturday. England scored their seventh try in the 77th minute and converted for 46-45. If the score held for a few more minutes, Ireland would have been crowned the champion. But France pressed yet again with 14 men, lost possession, regained it, and earned two simultaneous penalties after the fulltime siren. Captain Antoine Dupont debated with referee Nika Amashukeli where the penalty spots were. Ramos, who did not miss a goal-kick all night, finally lined up his seventh
Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions’ outfielder Chen Chieh-hsien, who fractured his left index finger earlier during the World Baseball Classic (WBC), is expected to be sidelined for four to six weeks. The Uni-Lions confirmed in a news statement on Friday that Chen had a distal fracture in his left index finger. The diagnosis followed X-ray and CT scans conducted at the Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital earlier that day. According to the club, the injury would require four to six weeks to heal. During this period, Chen must wear a protective splint but is permitted to engage in light, sport-specific training. The team plans to
RSS