I don't remember if it was canceled, and maybe Brock and Dwight were on the field at the time, but it was a fall afternoon against Portland State, feels like 6 or 7 years ago...(?) - and I felt weird and got out of my seat and headed up to the tunnels at Aggie Stadium because it felt like tornado weather based on the sky and the slow swirling winds, 5 minutes later, the PA cleared the stadium seating and eventually there was a tornado warning for Yolo County in the Davis area.

I think we ended up finishing the game because it was not raining much nor cracking heavy thunder...just a weird weather event.

there was that weather game and another one where the stadium lights were accidentally turned off and there was a lengthy delay before they could turn back on. But both games did complete 4 quarters. The only no contests I could find in recent history were 2021 Southern vs Florida Memorial, 2016 Bethune-Cookman vs North Texas, 2005 FIU vs South Florida. Could be others because they disappear from records faster than a congressman’s mistress but still seems pretty rare. Sometimes games are cancelled, rescheduled, or moved to alternate locations for hurricanes but those aren’t no contest.

Thanks BlueGold. I can see the rationale but I don't like it.

The no contest UC Davis vs. Mercer football game showed a flaw in how college football handles prematurely ended contests. Perhaps a new system, leveraging modern technology, is needed to ensure fairness for both players and teams

For the players the ramifications of a no contest is their stats are wiped out. For the best skill players and best defense players this is a hit to their season and career. For non skill players and non starters this is not a big deal. I believe this is unfair to the players.

For the team records this is a big deal with such a limited number of games. If this was MLB with a 162 game schedule a no contest usually is not a big deal. However with a limited number of FCS football games this is a big swing. Thinking about the impact that not having a win means for a football program, I feel as if there needs to be a mechanism to make these types of games count for wins and loses plus stats.

The next question is how to make this fair. While no system without a full 60 is going to be fair but what might be a good substitute for that. In the UCD Mercer game both sides can rightfully "know “ that they were going to win the game. I am sure that the sidelines on both sides knew that this was their game to win. That is what makes this a good test case. It wasn't like the Aggies were up by 25 points which would have taken 4 scores for the Bears to pass them.

So how do you make this somewhat fair? 50 years ago a coin flip might have been ok, but this is 2025. Sports betting, and networks have all kinds of algorithms that will give current odds of a team winning in sports in the second half.

So my thought bubble goes like this. When the UCD and Mercer game was called this how the new process would work.. First point is that the stats are counted for the players up to the stopping point of the game. The outcome of the game will then be decided off the field. Last week this could have been on ESPN. A pre-arranged algorithm will be used to determine the odds of each team winning at the stopped point For the thought bubble let’s say the odds at the conclusion of play had the Ags with a 57% chance of winning. There will be a coin toss with the Head Coaches. The officials crew will still be there and all the officials crew will have their phone generate a random number between 1 and 99. The winning coach will then ask one member of the officiating crew to show the generated random number. In our thought bubble the number is 42 and the Ags win and Mercer loses.

Comments and or thoughts?

There is no reason to couple whether the stats count with whether the game counts. The fairest outvome short of finishing the game is to have no winner or loser but count the stats.

Throwing out the individual stats makes no sense to me at all. Losing these individual stats could possibly be the difference for some players getting post-season awards and honors and/or school records at the end of the season. The players on both teams got cheated by this asinine rule. Their individual stats should count.

I think having no winner or loser is fair to both teams in a game that was not finished. I also think it would be fair for the game to be officially posted in the schedule for both teams showing the score and time left when the game was stopped and leave it at that. Nothing goes in the win or loss column but at least there is some information available about the status of the game at the time it was halted. So the Aggie schedule, for example, would be "game suspended due to weather at 7:46 of the 4th quarter with Davis ahead 23-17."

The good news about throwing out the individual stats is that our kicker is still perfect! He's the biggest winner in the no contest.

what happens if the random number is 43? Sorry, I had to go there.