Norfolk State had Saturday’s game against NC Central wrapped up with a five-point lead and less than two minutes remaining. Coach Michael Vick called for a kneel-down. His team ignored him, changing to a run call that led to a fumble.
NC Central, which had no timeouts to stop the clock before the fumble, scored a go-ahead touchdown a minute later to escape with a baffling 29-28 victory.
“I don’t know what happened at the end of the game,” Vick told reporters after a loss that dropped Norfolk State to 4-6 on the season. “I put my headset down. I called victory formation. All we had to do was take a knee, kneel the clock out. That’s just situational football.”
People were interested in these podcasts
But the play call changed somewhere in the chain. Norfolk State quarterback Deljay Bailey ran to the left side, losing 13 yards and the football when a NC Central defender hit him.
“I don’t know what happened in regards to that. I looked up and we was running the ball, and then I seen the fumble,” Vick said after the game. “But my final instructions was victory formation. That’s when you kneel it out. And they had, I think, zero timeouts left and the game was over practically.”
The clock would not have totally expired for Norfolk State, but solid hangtime on a fourth-down punt would’ve effectively ended the matchup. Instead, Vick’s Spartans dropped to 4-6 in his second season as coach.
The former NFL quarterback became the 19th head coach in program history when he accepted the job in 2025. The Spartans finished with a 1-11 record last season.
Saturday’s loss might sting more than any of last year’s defeat, though.
“People will look at that, and that’ll go on as a teaching tape for a lot of teams across the country for years to come,” Vick said. “I hate it had to be us. But I called victory formation. Just letting everybody know that. I called victory.”
Contact the author
Please read our comment policy before commenting.