Pretty amazing, even for their standards. The Advocate (the Baton Rouge daily, not the national gay newspaper) harps all over the interception denied Patrick Peterson in its post-game coverage of LSU / Alabama today but had not a word – literally, not a single word – about the other blown opportunity LSU had to get the ball back before Alabama scored its game-cinching field goal.
Bama punted, you see, with seven and a half minutes to go and the Tide up by six. The Tigers received the punt inside their 20 with plenty of time remaining and in a position to win with a touchdown. But Daniel Graff ran in to the kicker, giving Bama the ball back with a 4th and short situation. They converted that to keep the drive alive and set up the controversial Peterson interception/non-interception.
The Graff penalty wasn’t a controversial call – he clearly ran into the kicker’s leg and got the minimal five-yard penalty instead of a 15-yard, automatic first-down roughing call. And I guess that means it’s not worthy of a single word from The Advocate. But it was a huge turning point in the game – it took the ball out of LSU’s hands as surely as the Peterson ruling did. This, though, was LSU’s fault.
