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Rutgers Suffers All-Time Bad Beat After Missed Field Goal Turns Into Game-Winning Touchdown

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Illinois Rutgers Timeout Field Goal Schiano
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Rutgers was 14 seconds away from an upset victory over Illinois but head coach Greg Schiano decided to call a timeout. The stoppage led directly to the most brutal loss of the entire college football season.

A 53-yard missed field goal turned into a 40-yard game-winning touchdown.

Schiano is going to catch a lot of heat for his decision because it didn’t work out, but it was not necessarily the wrong call. He followed pretty standard coaching procedure and got burned.

The Scarlet Knights took a one-point lead on a 10-play, 65-yard scoring drive with one minute and eight seconds remaining in the fourth quarter. Illini quarterback Luke Altmeyer took over on offense at his own 25-yard-line with all three timeouts at his disposal. It took seven plays to go 45 yards.

  • 11-yard pass
  • Sack
  • Timeout Illinois
  • 21-yard pass
  • Incomplete pass
  • Incomplete pass
    • 10-yard penalty, defensive holding
  • Two-yard run
  • Timeout Illinois
  • Incomplete pass
  • Five-yard penalty, false start
  • Incomplete pass
  • Timeout Illinois

The Illini had 4th-and-13 from Rutgers’ 40-yard-line with 14 seconds left. Head coach Bret Bielema sent out his kicker, Ethan Moczulski, for a 58-yard attempt. If it went in, Illinois likely wins the game.

Olano missed wide left. However, Schiano called a timeout right before the snap to ice the kicker so the miss didn’t count.

Bielema saw that Olano’s kick never stood a chance and very quickly changed his mind. He sent his offense back out onto the field for what was, essentially, 4th-and-ballgame.

Altmeyer completed a pass over the middle to Illinois’ star wide receiver and the Scarlet Knights defense collapsed. Pat Bryant scampered into the end zone for the game-winning touchdown.

He cut back across the field and went completely untouched. Not even so much as a finger!

Illinois defeated Rutgers 38-31 because Greg Schiano called a timeout to prevent a missed field goal. It was the worst bad beat of the college football season.