A season hanging on 16 seconds

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — “The game is over.”

Referee Dennis Lipski announced the end of North Carolina’s season while Tennessee players ran onto the field celebrating their seventh win of the season with a 20-17 victory in the Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowl.

UNC linebacker Quan Sturdivant said he was devastated. Defensive tackle Quinton Coples said to himself Tennessee “had got them one.”

Then, Lipski’s microphone turned on again to declare a review of the final play.

Lo and behold, the game and UNC’s season wasn’t over. Nothing could stop the Tar Heels — not a Shaun Draughn run with 16 seconds remaining and no timeouts, or the offense and special teams simultaneously on the field for a snap or Tennessee fans projecting objects from the stands toward the UNC bench.

When Casey Barth finally got the chance to kick the game-tying, 39-yard field goal, it admittedly wasn’t his longest kick, but it was straight.

“I thought we were done,” Barth said. “Coaches told me just keep kicking and you’ll get your shot.

“I just knew it was going straight so I just started yelling.”

Tennessee head coach Derek Dooley spoke in broken English in the post-game press conference. Dooley suffered a similar loss to Louisiana State earlier in the year where the Volunteers believed they won it as the clock expired. Those memories were hard to suppress.

“I thought I’d see it all in Baton Rouge,” Dooley said. “But just when you think you’ve seen it all, you haven’t.”

Dooley had several gripes about the final 16 seconds of the game, but it was obvious his filter kept him from saying what he thought. He mentioned different NFL rules, substitution violations and referees sprinting to spot the ball in the waning seconds of the game.

“There will be a lot of things brought up for discussion in the offseason about game management, end-of-the-game management and end-of-the-game rules,” Dooley said. “I hope there will be.”

After securing his first bowl win with the Tar Heels, coach Butch Davis had no qualms with how the game ended.

“Our game isn’t the NFL,” said UNC coach Butch Davis, who has coached at both levels. “There are a lot of rules that are different between the NFL and college.”

While the game will be remembered for the final 16 seconds of regulation, nothing defined the game more than the final scene from LP Field. After the 69,143 fans cleared the stadium, the field remained littered on both sides. UNC’s end zone sparkled with confetti while its orange counterpart had debris scattered from pylon to pylon.

“I think ESPN Classic will probably be showing this 100 years from now,” Davis said.