Las Vegas Raiders coach Antonio Pierce said Saturday that his team “heard a whistle” on its sideline during the calamitous final play of Friday’s 19-17 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs and will send the NFL video of the play for a review. Such reviews are often a standard process for teams when they disagree with how a play is officiated in hopes the league at least acknowledges a mistake.
On the final play, center Jackson Powers-Johnson snapped the ball before quarterback Aidan O’Connell was ready. The ball bounced off O’Connell’s chest and was recovered by the Chiefs to secure Kansas City’s victory.
Before the fumbled had been recovered, one referee appeared to run in from the Raiders’ sideline and make the signal for a false-start penalty against Las Vegas — but the infraction was changed to an illegal shift. The Raiders players and coaches protested the change because a false start is a dead-ball penalty and they heard one official whistle the play dead, and therefore the fumble wouldn’t have counted.
The Raiders fumble it, the Chiefs recover it to seal the game ‼️#LVvsKC on Prime Video
Also streaming on #NFLPlus pic.twitter.com/WvNvUONRM5— NFL (@NFL) November 29, 2024
The Athletic reached out to the NFL after the game to get clarity on the official’s ruling on the play. NFL senior vice president of football and international communications Michael Signora responded via email, saying: “Had the clock been running at the snap, then by rule an illegal shift would convert to a false start. Since the clock was stopped (due to the spike on the second-down play), an illegal shift is a live-ball foul.”
The Raiders were at the 32-yard line with 15 seconds left in the game, within range for a potential game-winning field goal — although kicker Daniel Carlson had already missed three field goals on the day. The botched snap makes the Raiders the first team since at least 2000 to turn it over in the final 30 seconds when in field-goal range (35-yard line or closer) and trailing by one or two points, per the Associated Press’ Josh Dubow.
The loss is the eighth straight for the 2-10 Raiders.
Leading up to the blunder, Las Vegas spiked the ball with 16 seconds left after a 7-yard pass to Ameer Abdullah. Pierce and O’Connell both said the Raiders wanted to run another play — and throw the ball out of bounds — to kill more clock, something they could have done had they simply waited to spike the ball. Instead, O’Connell lined up in shotgun formation and clapped his hands, but it was a signal for his teammates to hurry up and not for Powers-Johnson to snap the ball.
Asked Saturday morning if he would do anything differently on the sequence at the end of the game, Pierce said, “No.” He added that he sent a text to his players, coaches and other team personnel thanking them for their effort in a tough loss on a short week against one of the best teams in the league.
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(Photo: Emily Curiel / Kansas City Star / Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
