The Southeastern Conference will have instant replay this season.
But the system still would not correct two controversial errors last season – clock management in the Tennessee-Florida game and Cory Webster’s uncalled pass interference against Alabama.
The SEC, along with eight other Division I-A conferences, has installed instant replay on an experimental basis for the 2005 season.
“The objective of instant replay is to allow the specific types of officiating mistakes to be immediately reviewed and corrected,” SEC Coordinator of Officials Bobby Gaston said at SEC media days in July.
Indisputable video evidence is required in order to overturn a call on the field, and the replay official, not a coach’s challenge like the NFL uses, determines whether to stop the game to review a call.
“They [coaches] can encourage us by taking a time out and turning and staring at the replay booth, and that might prompt us a little bit into action to take it a little bit farther,” Gaston said. “If they have a strong feeling and willing to waste a time out, because right or wrong, they don’t get the time out back.”
South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier said he likes the system with there not being a coach’s challenge.
“It eliminates the coaches from even considering challenging this one or that one,” Spurrier said at the SEC media days. “If the head ref has a call that, well, we’re not sure of, let’s check it out. We got the technology now to get it right.”
Although the game may not be stopped for a review, it does not mean the play was not reviewed in the replay booth.
The SEC will use the Digital Replay System, which is similar to TiVO, and will have touch-screen technology with a live feed into the replay booth from either the television network broadcasting the game or other television-production facilities.
The replay official will be constantly reviewing the game and will stop play if more time is needed to decide whether a play should stay the same or be overturned.
Gaston said he envisions at least 90 of the approximately 170 plays that occur during a game will be reviewed in the booth.  
Fouls, like holding and pass interference, are not reviewable and neither is correcting clock adjustments not in conjunction with overturned plays.
“The instant replay deal has tried to keep the replay people out of actually officiating the game,” Gaston said. “They’re only there to correct the mistake that they [field officials] made.”
Plays that are subject to replay, include the touching of a pass by an ineligible receiver or defensive player, whether a ball was caught or dropped, and to determine if a player was in bounds.
If a play that includes a possible fumble is blown dead by the whistle, then it is unreviewable.
“I think the officials will be a little hesitant, when the ball is loose, unless they are 100 percent sure that he was down,” Gaston said. “I think you will see them go [call] fumble since it can be reviewed and overturned, then I think that that’s what’s going to happen.”
Gaston said the non-conference schools playing against SEC teams have accepted the use of instant replay in those games.
The SEC also made several rule changes in offseason.
The definition of the intentional grounding pocket was changed to within the tackles instead five yards from where the ball was snapped, which is closer to the tight end.
Leaping, the penalty called on Ronnie Prude during the Auburn game last season, has been altered.
It will now be called if a player comes from more than one yard off the line of scrimmage and leaps and lands on any player instead of just the opponent.
The SEC took out the word “intentional” in the spearing rule, which is when a player leads into an opponent with his helmet and will now call spearing whether it is intentional.
They also banned clipping and the clipping zone altogether. A player can now only block above the waist and down the hamstring, but he cannot block at the knee or below from the rear.
 
Contact Clinton Duckworth at [email protected]