The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1508023
38 THE WOLVERINE ❱ OCTOBER 2023 F ans may have noticed a new wrinkle to the college football landscape over the first weekends with the implementa- tion of new clock rules in 2023. Starting this season, the clock does not stop after first downs except in the last two minutes of each half. Other wrinkles in the new rules: Teams can no longer call consecutive timeouts, and untimed downs will only happen at the end of the second and fourth quarters. "No. 1 is to keep the game moving, the pace of play," national coordinator of of- ficials Steve Shaw told The Athletic this summer. "No. 2 is to modestly take out plays in the game. In FBS, we averaged 178 plays per game last year. If you look at the NFL, they averaged 151 plays per game — so, that's a pretty significant dif- ference. There is not a target goal but just the idea that we wanted to modestly re- duce the number of plays per game. The commissioners support that as well. And finally, we want our clock mechanics to be exactly the same between every official." Michigan assistant coaches Steve Clinkscale (defensive backs/co-defen- sive coordinator) and Kirk Campbell (quarterbacks) were asked to address the new rules during Week 2 press confer- ences. Both are at peace with the adjust- ments. "I'm a defensive guy, so I think, for the game, the rules that they make help the guys and their safety," Clinkscale said. "The number of plays that the offensive teams want to get, they eliminate that a little bit. A couple more plays and players are at risk for injury and stuff. I'm fine with it. Things like that, I think it changes the games, a couple of minutes. At the end of the day, it's still about winning the point of attack, making your play. I'm fine with that. Any rule that they put in there for the players' safety I think is great. "When I'm recruiting, I'm talking to people all the time when I go to these schools, and the offense wants to get 100 plays in a game. I tell people all the time, as a defensive player that's going to ex- pose you to injury and expose you to just being on the field more. You think it gives you more opportunity to make a play, but when you're out there 80 snaps as a de- fense, usually it doesn't end great for you. "We're out there 25 snaps a half and another 30-40 in the second half, usually we can control our outcome." Campbell, who called the offensive plays in Michigan's 30-3 win over East Carolina, has kept a close eye on how the new rule has affected other teams early in the year. It might actually have a positive impact on how the Wolverines want to play. Through the first two games of the sea- son, U-M's offense was on the field for 123 snaps, identical to the opening few weeks of the 2022 campaign. "The early games, I played close atten- tion to see how those played out and how they flowed," Campbell said. "We knew that our style of football, it may impact us more than anybody else because we run the football. We get more first downs than most teams. A lot of people get a lot of chunk plays, so we thought it could impact us in a positive way because we can control the clock more. We were cog- nizant of that. In the game, it never really played a huge role as far as the outcome of it, but we were cognizant, we're paying attention to that weekly." ❱ MICHIGAN FOOTBALL Assistants Weigh In On New Clock Rule Defensive co-coordinator Steve Clinkscale said that he believes the new college football clock rules are a positive change for the players and their safety. PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL