U News

Pac-12 officials

Pac-12 officials, The Pacific-12 Conference reprimanded the officials who worked Wisconsin's game at Arizona State on Saturday, which ended with the Badgers failing to attempt a game-winning field goal because of confusion in the game's final 18 seconds.

With under a minute left, Wisconsin drove 70 yards to set up a first down on ASU's 13-yard line. In what turned out to be the game's final play, Badgers quarterback Joel Stave ran left to try to center the ball for a kick attempt, downing the ball by touching his right knee to the grass. An official whistled the play dead. But an ASU linebacker thought the ball was live and jumped on it. The clock expired during the confusion.

A conference news release Monday said that, "Neither the referee nor anyone on his crew moved with appropriate urgency to clearly communicate that the ball was to be spotted so play could resume promptly."

The Champions League begins on Tuesday with a familiar look: Defending champion Bayern Munich are the favorites, according to British bookmaker William Hill, with Spanish powers Barcelona and Real Madrid close behind. English sides Chelsea, Manchester United and Manchester City are considered the chasing pack.

But there are some new faces: 19 of the 32 teams in the field have managers who haven't completed more than a single season with their current clubs.

Pep Guardiola (Bayern Munich), Carlo Ancelotti (Real Madrid) and Jose Mourinho (Chelsea) are in their first seasons with their current clubs and have six Champions League titles among them. But nine of the 32 managers don't have that kind of Champions League experience. In fact, they are all making their group stage debuts.

Last season also saw nine managers on their first Champions League adventures—mostly with lower-profile clubs—and only two of their teams made it out of the group stage. Neither saw the quarterfinals.