Michigan's epic Hail Mary win over Western Michigan on Saturday will go down in the history books for both the incredible catch - and the question as to whether the play should have even happened.
The 27.5-point underdog Broncos appeared to have completed the incredible upset when Bryce Underwood's initial Hail Mary flew out of the back of the end zone as time expired. However, the officials reviewed the play and put one second back on the clock to give the Wolverines one more chance. By now, we all know how that ended up.
Social media erupted in shock and awe at both the play itself and the decision to add the extra second despite what appeared to be clear evidence the clock hit zero.
In a rare move, Western Michigan president Russ Kavalhuna conducted a postgame press conference and calmly outlined that the school would be contacting the MAC office as to possible next steps.
"We'll talk to our commissioner and we'll try to see if there's anything that we can ask for a review on," he said. "Frankly, I don't know if we can. I just want everyone to know that this football team deserves a second look, if that's possible."
It's not just Western Michigan's side that is wondering if the final second was justified, as NBC rules analyst Terry McAulay was among those confused by the ruling.
"Our producer tells us that our inset clock is the actual stadium clock. The ball isn't even close to touching a player when it goes to zero," McCauley said on the broadcast. "Now their system - their Hawk-Eye system - apparently, either had a different sync or whatever, and they came up with one second when it touched the players. I don't see how that happened, assuming our clock is correct. It is clearly not touching a player. The ball is clearly still in the air when the clock goes to zero on our screen. The Big Ten is going to have to tell a lot of us, how did they get to one second on this play?"
The officials for the contest were from the Big Ten, but the conference had yet to make them available for comment following the contest.
