Joey McGuire's beef with officiating: 'You wonder how there's no flag. Like, holy moly'
Texas Tech football coach Joey McGuire made passing references Monday to disagreements with defensive pass interference not being called on two plays involving his receivers in the Red Raiders' loss Saturday to Kansas State.
"The first interception, gah, go back and watch that and you wonder how there's no flag. Like, holy moly," McGuire said. "We forced the ball probably a little bit, but Myles (Price) gets hit way before that ball gets there."
Safety V.J. Payne intercepted Jake Strong late in the third quarter, right after Kansas State had scored a go-ahead touchdown. The Wildcats scored again on the play after Payne's interception to go up 31-21.
McGuire was asked about the play in the context of having an inexperienced true freshman throwing from his 17-yard line, the team having just fallen behind.
McGuire said he also was surprised there was no flag on Strong's 8-yard touchdown pass to Jerand Bradley midway through the third that put Tech ahead 21-17. Bradley caught it in the back of the end zone over cornerback Jacob Parrish, both falling backward with contact.
"Bradley made a big, contested catch for that touchdown," McGuire said. " ... It was a touchdown, definitely, but how you don't get a flag on that play, too, is always kind of interesting, I guess."
McGuire was discussing the play in the context of the Red Raiders' receivers needing to be more physical.
"One of the things coming out of the game on Saturday is really challenging guys to be more physical in their routes," McGuire said, "and whenever things break down, the scramble drill comes into account and getting open. You go back and look through in that game and some of our receivers, I thought, got pushed around.
"Now, some of those pushing-arounds, it's kind of interesting that (Tech cornerback) Malik (Dunlap) gets called on one thing and some of the other stuff doesn't get called."
Big 12 teams get weekly feedback from Greg Burks, the conference's coordinator of officials. After its loss last year at TCU, Tech sent in disagreements with how nine plays were officiated. Burks agreed with Tech's contention on three, seemingly acknowledging errors, and disagreed with Tech's contention on six.
Tech athletics director Kirby Hocutt subsequently emailed Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark, calling the officiating in the Tech-TCU game "more egregious than usual" and asking for continued discussions of how "we can hold officials more accountable."
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This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Joey McGuire beef: 'You wonder how there's no flag. Like, holy moly'
