Virginia Tech Coach James Franklin Says It Was “Un-American” To Penalize RB For High-Fiving Military Corps After Touchdown

Aaron Ryan·
CULTURESPORTS
·
Virginia Tech RB Marcellous Hawkins touchdown
ACC Network

I’m sorry, I thought this was America.

The James Franklin era at Virginia Tech got off to a hot start yesterday as the Hokies scored a monster 73-3 win over VMI for their first win of the season.

And sure, it may not have been the best opponent, but it’s always good to start out the season with a dominating win, especially in your first game under a new head coach that can set the tone for the rest of the season.

One of the highlights for the Hokies was Marcellous Hawkins, the senior running back who started his career at Central Missouri before transferring to Virginia Tech ahead of the 2025 season. Despite serving as the secondary back to Jeffrey Overton Jr.,  Hawkins rushed for 69 yards and three touchdowns on just 12 carries, with Overton Jr. adding another two scores himself in the dominant victory.

On his third touchdown of the night, Hawkins punched it in on 2nd and goal from the two yard line with 6:59 left in the third quarter. And afterwards, he ran over to high five the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets seated behind the end zone.

If you’re not familiar with Virginia Tech, it was started as an all-male military school, and is still designated as a senior military college under federal law. The Corps of Cadets is the military arm of the school, with cadets receiving leadership training and the opportunity to pursue commissions in one of five branches of the military.

Well unfortunately, the recognition of the cadets after the touchdown ended up drawing a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. And after the game, Franklin was quick to express his displeasure with the flag, calling it ‘un-American to penalize the team for high-fiving members of the military:

“We got a penalty for high-fiving one of our members of the Corps. I’m not a huge fan. I don’t know why we can’t high-five somebody in the military. It seems somewhat un-American to me.”

Amen, coach.

Of course it was far from the most controversial call from officiating during week 1 of college football, with the Big Ten officials in the matchup between Michigan and Western Michigan stealing the show and robbing us of one of the all-time great upsets in college football.

The Broncos kicked their final field goal with just 1:15 left on the clock to make the score 12 to 7, meaning Michigan needed to drive down the field to score in just over a minute if they wanted to avoid what would have been considered one of the biggest upsets in the history of college football.

With no timeouts left and only 9 seconds on the clock, Michigan was forced to throw a Hail Mary, which star quarterback Bryce Underwood actually overthrew, and ball fell to the ground outside the back of the end zone as the clock hit triple zeros. That’s at least how us casual college football fans saw it play out.

Here’s how it looked in real time:

As Western Michigan began celebrating what would have been the MAC program’s signature upset for the ages (Michigan was predicted to be a Big Ten powerhouse this season) the refs suddenly announced that the previous play was under review. When the broadcast took another look at it, they confirmed that there shouldn’t be any time left on the clock, and that Western Michigan had won the game.

But the Big Ten referees evidently saw something else (more on that shortly), and said that they were putting one second back on the clock, which gave Underwood and Michigan one more shot at an unlikely hail mary. Sure enough, here’s what happened with the Wolverines and their second chance:

Admittedly, it was an impressive throw and catch… but Michigan shouldn’t have ever gotten that second chance.

College football fans were almost certain that what they saw play out on the field was rigged in favor of Michigan. And everyone was waiting for some sort of official review from the Big Ten and its referees. Late into the night, the conference did finally provide a statement and what they call “video evidence” of the one second being added back onto the clock:

“Following video review, it was determined Western Michigan’s #18 started his jump from an established out-of-bounds position (left foot) and made contact with the ball with one second remaining on the clock. As shown in the provided video of what was viewed during the replay process, a side-by-side view of the play and the game clock, using a direct shot of the game clock in the stadium, was used to determine the final ruling.

Eighty-five minutes prior to the game, all broadcast cameras used for the replay system, including the camera on the game clock, are synced using a strobe system to ensure all cameras are aligned.

Per NCAA Football rule 4-2-3-a, ‘A ball not in player control, other than a kick that scores a field goal, is out of bounds when it touches the ground, a player, a game official or anything else that is out-of-bound [sic], or that is on or outside a boundary line,’ and thus the clock is stopped.”

Yeah… no one is buying that.

If all the clocks are synced prior to the game, why was the official clock the broadcast was referencing different from the one Big Ten refs used? In the broadcast replay, the football is still in the air as the triple zeros appear.

Conveniently, the clock the Big Ten provided in that video above has “0:01” on the clock when a player touches the football.

College football fans still think it was fixed:

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