Dan Lanning comments on late personal fouls against the Ducks, questionable officiating
The Oregon Ducks’ win over Washington State was dramatic in more ways than one.
Pac-12 officials once again became a topic of conversation during the game — a weekly occurrence around the league — as a number of questionable calls sparked controversy.
First there was a sequence where the officials forgot what down Washington State was on, shorted the Cougars a down, then corrected the mistake after Washington State had punted the ball away to Oregon. Officials gave the ball back to Washington State to run a third-and-17 play that resulted in a short gain and another punt back to Oregon.
Late in the game, a pair of personal foul calls went against Oregon defenders. First, outside linebacker DJ Johnson was ejected on a targeting call that many thought was a clean hit. Then, Brandon Dorlus was flagged for hands to the face of the quarterback on a play many — even the broadcast crew for FOX calling the game — thought should have included offsetting penalties with an intentional grounding flag that wasn’t called against Washington State.
After the game, Oregon head coach Dan Lanning was asked about the calls. He said he’s still looking for answers.
“I’m looking forward to getting some explanations on some of those,” Lanning said. “I hate to see it come down to calls like that. We have to do a better job, obviously, of coaching that on our side of the ball, but I’m anxious to look at the film and get the interpretation on some of those plays at the end.
“Can’t lose our composure and give an extended drive. We’re about to be in a great situation, we get a late personal foul. That can never happen. We can’t be that team. It almost cost us and we’re lucky it didn’t. We’re gonna learn from it. I can promise you that. That being said, there’s a couple of odd things that happened today that I’m looking forward to hearing explanations on.”
The two personal fouls in particular were not popular.
DJ Johnson getting called for targeting for hitting WSU's Cameron Ward in the chest is confirmed, and that might be worse than the missed down call by the refs on WSU earlier in the game. Total textbook tackle. Hit in the chest. Wow.
— Matt Prehm (@MattPrehm) September 24, 2022
So if Dorlus was called for hands to the face, as it was, why not call the intentional grounding and have offsetting penalties? @pac12
— Justin Hopkins (@JHopkinsSD) September 24, 2022
As Johnson was called for targeting in the second half, he’ll be forced to sit the first half of Oregon’s game next week against Stanford at home.
Per updated targeting rules for the new season, Oregon and the Pac-12 office can request a review from the national coordinator of officials, and if it’s determined the targeting call was incorrectly applied, the player in question would be cleared to play in the first half of the next game. We’ll see if Lanning wants to go that route.