This in-season rules interpretation was made as a result of the play that took place in the third quarter with 4:49 to go on Oregon's 18 yard line.  Cougars QB Cameron Ward tossed the ball up and caught it before eventually throwing a check down to Ollie for a three-yard gain.

 

Washington State pass play against Oregon leads to in-season rules interpretation by NCAA

WWW.OREGONLIVE.COM

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National coordinator of football officials and NCAA secretary rules editor Steve Shaw explained the in-season rules interpretation made as a result of the play during his weekly rules review video.

 

I can see why this rule re-interpretation was put in place. When the defense sees this, even as a fake, they crash down to stop a run play but then it leads to another pass which the defense cannot fully react to. But the rule change means it can still be a fake but a run play is still THE play... or at least a play behind the line of scrimmage. The way this play will probably get redrawn is that they do the fake fly sweep like that and then the quarterback throws a backwards pass to the edge. 

 

I guess this was really just a lazy trick play.

I don't remember the play as it went down.  Are they saying the WSU QB tossed the ball to himself intentionally to fool the defense and then cranked back to toss it a second time for a 3 yard gain?  Of course that should be illegal.  What's the penalty for an illegal forward pass, 5 yards and loss of down?  Who knows, maybe WSU doesn't go on to score on the next play because of the 8 year difference and maybe Oregon shouldn't have had to come back from such a deep a deficit as they did.