The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets played themselves in the worst way at the end of their stunning loss to The Citadel.
The Yellow Jackets found themselves down three at the Citadel 17 with one timeout to go as the fourth quarter clock ticked under ten seconds. Tech snapped the ball and dramatically ran it in for what would have been a go-ahead touchdown that almost certainly would’ve meant they won.
Just one problem: coach Geoff Collins had called timeout just before the snap, nullifying the entire play.
Georgia Tech thought it'd won the game with a last-second touchdown…but the Yellow Jackets called a timeout just before the snap. pic.twitter.com/EP9dX9w7q2
— CBS Sports HQ (@CBSSportsHQ) September 14, 2019
In Collins’ defense, it’s understandable why he’d call timeout. Time was running out, his offense was dawdling a bit on the snap, and they needed to do something to guarantee themselves a field goal and overtime before the clock ran out entirely. An unsuccessful play that ran the clock down too far could have been fatal. He had no way to know that his team was about to bust a big touchdown run.
Ultimately, the Yellow Jackets did convert the field goal to force overtime, but lost after missing a field goal on the first drive of overtime. We’ve seen icing the kicker backfire before with a timeout that didn’t work, but this might be a new one.
