Nov. 4 2005
By J.P. Giglio
staff writer
You've got tickets for Saturday's game in Chapel Hill.
You've packed the car with a cooler and a grill.
How about a pillow?
College football games last longer than a Renee Zellweger marriage. Across the ACC, the average game time is 3 hours and 22 minutes for games through Oct. 22. That's up 8 minutes from all games a year ago. The Tar Heels' first six games were even longer at an average of 3 hours and 29 minutes.
At UNC, the average game time is almost a half-hour longer than it was 20 years ago. It won't get any shorter Saturday with the Heels' game against Boston College being shown on television.
"Too long, way too long," said Georgia Tech coach Chan Gailey after his team outlasted UNC in a 3-hour, 50-minute epic in September. "It feels like we've been playing two hours, and I look up at the scoreboard and there's four minutes left in the first quarter."
A combination of college's clock rules and TV commercials have caused the increase. Instant replay is not a culprit. The addition of replay to the ACC this season has added only an average of 1 minute and 27 seconds.
Get used to the long games.
N.C. State coach Chuck Amato, a member of the board of trustees for the American Football Coaches Association, said the topic is discussed "every year" but there hasn't been any action to change it.
The easy thing to do is blame television and expansion and the ACC's new TV deal, but the NFL, even with more commercials, plays a shorter game at 3:08.
So what's the delay?
Penalties and incomplete passes are inherent stoppages in the game, college or pro. However, there are four major differences in the timing of the college game: the play clock, first downs, out-of-bounds and halftime.
The college game uses a 25-second play clock, compared to a 40-second play clock in the NFL. A shorter play clock equals more plays per game, which opens the door for more incomplete passes or penalties. The average NFL game has 151 plays per game, including kickoffs and extra points; the college game is closer to 170.
After every first down in college football, the clock stops until the first-down markers are moved and set. The NFL doesn't stop the clock for any first downs.
If a college player goes out of bounds, the clock stops and doesn't start until the ball is snapped for the next play. In the NFL, if a player goes out of bounds, the clock stops until the ball is set, then starts before the snap. During the final five minutes of the second and fourth quarters, the clock stops until the ball is snapped, as in college.
Also, halftime lasts 20 minutes in college and just 12 in the NFL.
"Every little spot is an opportunity to pick up [time]," Amato said.
AFCA president Grant Teaff said the timing topic has been overshadowed by replay and the postseason at the coaches' association's annual meetings.
Teaff said the board of trustees would have to recommend any changes involving game times and present a proposal to the NCAA rules committee.
The issue has never gotten that far, Teaff said.
"It appears to be rearing its ugly head again," Teaff said. "When the games go too long, you lose the attention span of everybody. Nobody wants that, especially the television networks. They really disdain anything past 3 hours and 15 minutes."
The ACC's television partners would have the power to influence the coaches' association.
Disney's ESPN and ABC own the national league contract with the ACC. An ESPN spokesman said they have not researched the data and would not comment.
Jefferson-Pilot Communications produces the weekly noon game for the ACC. Jimmy Rayburn, an executive producer for Jefferson-Pilot, said college coaches are reluctant to make any changes to the college game to make it resemble the NFL.
"That really gets them going," Rayburn said. "You mention the NFL and they don't want to do anything the NFL does. Then again, nobody wanted replay three years ago, so ... "
With the additions of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College and a new emphasis on football, the ACC renegotiated its football and basketball television deals with Jefferson-Pilot in May 2004. The deal, worth about $35 million annually, is set through the 2010-2011 season.
Television commercials do add almost 30 minutes to each broadcast.
"You have to sell ads, and that's part of it," Amato said. "You have to have them."
Forty-five of the ACC's first 54 games were on television. For those games through Oct. 22, the average length of a TV game is 3:27, compared to 3:01 for those not on TV.
On the Jefferson-Pilot-produced broadcast, the typical format has six minutes of commercials per quarter, which equals 24 minutes. There is a two-minute break in between the first and second quarters and third and fourth quarters. That's four more minutes.
Any late-game timeouts could add another two minutes.
In the NFL, the commercials add up to 7:30 minutes per quarter or 30 minutes per game, with four minutes between quarters for a total of 34 minutes.
But the NFL, a slave to its multi-billion dollar TV contracts, makes sure it gets the games to fit into a 3:10 window.
Because there's no way around the commercials, the other options would have to be changed.
"We had talked about going to a 40-second clock, like the NFL. Shortening the time at halftime, like [the] NFL," Amato said. "But we felt that this is college football."
And in college football, the games keep getting longer and longer.
