Las Vegas Raiders coach Antonio Pierce is speaking out just over 24 hours after his team suffered a heartbreaking loss to the Kansas City Chiefs on Friday.

Pierce, who is in his first full season as the Raiders head coach, told members of the media that the Raiders believed referees had blown a whistle moments before the ill-fated fumble on the poorly timed snap. In the case of a whistle, the play in question would have been ruled dead.

Pierce also noted that the Raiders intend to submit video evidence in support of the claim to the NFL office for further review.

After the Raiders defense forced the Chiefs to punt with just over two minutes remaining in the game, Las Vegas quickly managed to get in position to attempt a game-winning field goal. But the Raiders had a costly miscue on third down from the Kansas City 38-yard line with just 15 seconds remaining.

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The Raiders center prematurely snapped the ball as quarterback Aidan O’Connell surveyed the Chiefs defense. The ball bounced off O’Connell and onto the turf. The Raiders signal caller was not able to corral the botched snap, and it was recovered by the Chiefs. 

Nov 29, 2024; Kansas City, Missouri, USA; Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Aidan O’Connell (12) fumbles the snap against the Kansas City Chiefs during the second half at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. (Denny Medley-Imagn Images)

Referees did throw a flag on the play and penalized the Raiders for an illegal shift, but Kansas City decided to decline the penalty since they recovered the fumble. The NFL did stipulate that a false start would have been assessed if the clock was running at the time of the mishandled snap.

Patrick Mahomes then took a knee to allow the final seconds to tick off the clock.

Nov 29, 2024; Kansas City, Missouri, USA; Kansas City Chiefs recover a fumbled snap during the second half at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. (Denny Medley-Imagn Images)

O’Connell shouldered the blame for the mishap on the crucial play.

“It’s completely my fault,” the second-year said. “I was looking out to the right to make sure the guys were set and I started clapping. In my head I was thinking, signal the ball to get the ball, but when I start clapping it tells Jackson to basically snap the ball. Jackson did exactly what he should have done and I clapped too early.

“… Super tough, but there’s really no one to blame but myself. So, that’s probably the hardest part to swallow.”

The win over the Raiders clinched a playoff spot for the Chiefs. Meanwhile, the Raiders will try and regroup when they travel to Tampa Bay next week for a matchup against the Buccaneers.

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In one of the craziest finishes in City Section championship history, senior Jacob Velazquez kicked a 32-yard field goal with no time left to lift Chatsworth over South Gate 38-36 in the Division II final Saturday at Birmingham High.

Jesse Leon was stopped short of the line to gain on fourth and one at the eight-yard line, giving the ball back to South Gate with less than 40 seconds left. Chatsworth called its last two timeouts on second and third downs to set up a fourth down at the two-yard line with eight seconds left.

South Gate quarterback Michael Gonzalez took the snap and ran around in the end zone until finally stepping over the back line with one second left for a safety.

The ensuing free kick from the 20-yard line was made off the ground, not on a tee, and the ball caromed laterally out of bounds without touching a player, resulting in a five-yard penalty. No time went off the clock and the Chancellors were awarded the ball at the 15, setting up the winning field goal.

“I didn’t think I’d get a chance to kick it there, but I was ready for the moment,” said Velazquez, who had made one field goal all season, in a league game against Granada Hills. “I’m always composed. Confidence is key. I knew it was good right away … it came off my foot perfectly.”

Velazquez was given the game ball and did not let go of it through the trophy presentation.

Sophomore Eric Myers carried 20 times for 143 yards, including a 17-yard run to cap the Rams’ first touchdown drive and a two-yard run to end an eight-play, 76-yard march that gave South Gate a 36-33 lead with 5:51 remaining.

Leon rushed for 141 yards and a touchdown for the third-seeded Chancellors (9-5), who lost to Fairfax in overtime last year in the Division II final at Valley College.

It was Chatsworth’s third section title and its first since claiming the Division II title in 1998.

South Gate (7-7) was seeking its first City title since 1988 when it won the 3A crown.

Iga Swiatek’s one-month suspension for unintentionally taking the banned substance trimetazidine (TMZ) comes down to picograms. World No. 2 Swiatek’s positive test, recorded August 12 and communicated to her alongside a provisional suspension September 12, detected 50 picograms of TMZ per milliliter of urine, which doping experts call a trace amount.

A picogram is 1,000th of a nanogram; there are one billion nanograms in a gram. Not the sort of usage that would provide any advantage in a tennis match.

Combined with Swiatek submitting her medications and supplements to independent laboratories alongside hair samples, those numbers led the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) to accept her explanation that she had taken a contaminated dose of melatonin, which she had used to help her sleep to combat jet lag.

Here are some more numbers.

On September 20, 15 days after Jessica Pegula knocked her out of the U.S. Open and eight days after being told she had tested positive, Swiatek announced she was going to skip one of the top tournaments of the year.

“Due to personal matters, I’m forced to withdraw from the China Open in Beijing,” Swiatek said in a statement. “I’m very sorry as I had an amazing time playing and winning this tournament last year and was really looking forward to being back there. I know that the fans will experience great tennis there and I’m sorry I won’t be a part of it this time.”

The announcement came after Swiatek spent the end of the summer rightfully talking about how exhausted she was following the Olympic Games in July and August, at which she took the bronze medal after an intense period that included winning her fourth French Open in five years, competing at Wimbledon, and not winning a gold medal for which she was viewed as champion-in-waiting. Skipping a tournament due to “personal matters” seemed to fit with that narrative. Fatigue. A medical issue. Burnout. Family stuff.

Under the broadest definition, “personal matters” does cover just about anything. That said, when someone uses that phrase, the immediate understanding generally involves some sort of health or family issue. It’s personal, and generally separate from something that’s either public or professional.

There’s also an implicit boundary request in the phrase: What’s going on is my own business.

But positive doping tests and provisional suspensions handed down by an anti-doping authority are not personal matters. Those are professional matters, in a profession that is very public.

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The ITIA holds off on announcing any positive test for 10 days so the player has the right to appeal the provisional suspension. If the player decides to appeal, the agency keeps the findings secret, and the player generally does, too. Then the process of testing, litigation and judging unfolds behind closed doors. In Swiatek’s case, her successful appeal allowed her to play the WTA Tour Finals and the Billie Jean King Cup Finals while that process was going on.

Swiatek’s team’s statement says that she “was unable to inform the public about the ongoing investigation”. The ITIA’s code subjects its officials, employees and associates to confidentiality, but nothing explicitly prohibits a player who has tested positive and is serving a provisional suspension during an appeal from explaining what’s going on.

So, if you feel that you have been misled the past few months, then join the club. “Personal matter” doesn’t begin to describe a positive doping test and the process that ensued, and in the the long run, that less-than-transparent explanation for her absence may end up harming Swiatek more than the positive test for unintentionally taking a performance-enhancing substance that likely had no effect on her performance.

Whose decision was it to describe this as a “personal matter”? Was any consideration given to saying something else?

On Friday, Paula Wolecka, a spokesperson for Swiatek, stated in an email that Swiatek had experienced great distress because she knew she was innocent of intentionally doping and had taken contaminated medicine.

“The decisions were made with the best intentions at every stage of the process, step by step, according to current knowledge of the team and circumstances,” Wolecka wrote.

“Iga did everything in her power to act fair, to follow the ITIA’s procedures and requirements and after the decision was officially published by the ITIA, provide everyone with as many details of the process as possible to be fully transparent. Being a good human being with a strong core of values is crucial to her and she does her best to act in line with it, on and off the court.”

In a video statement Thursday, Swiatek said, “The whole thing will definitely stay with me for the rest of my life.”

Both Swiatek’s one-month suspension and the decision not to ban Jannik Sinner for his two positive tests for clostebol, an anabolic steroid, have been conducted according to ITIA protocol. Both cases have also revealed deep wells of mistrust and anger within tennis from fans and players alike, confused at players being allowed to play while under investigation. Everything has been done by the book. The book appears in need of a rewrite.

There are also plenty of hard-nosed anti-doping officials who believe the science has gotten ahead of the rulebook. Swiatek tested negative multiple times before the positive test and then again after. That would indicate that she was not in the middle of a doping cycle, and the trace amount of TMZ suggested an unintentional use as well.

Iga Swiatek playing in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on November 3. (Robert Prange / Getty Images)

So perhaps provisional suspensions are not the way to go when the science says the athlete didn’t receive any benefit.

On a conference call with reporters Thursday, the ITIA’s chief executive, Karen Moorhouse, said the rules are in place to be fair to the players. “We’ve been absolutely transparent once they’ve reached an outcome,” Moorhouse said.

But is that transparent enough?

It’s true that players may not see much incentive for going public amid a period of uncertainty; that as soon as they announce they have tested positive for a banned substance and are under investigation, everyone will brand them as a cheater. Some no doubt would.

But a player is going to have to answer for the positive test eventually anyway. Would Swiatek, the ITIA and tennis be better off had they jointly come clean about this in September, rather than announcing it as done and dusted now, after Swiatek had spent the fall giving other explanations for her absence from competitive tennis?

It’s hard to not think so.

Now she has both tested positive and opted not to be “absolutely transparent” for two months. That’s not a very good combination.

It’s impossible to consider the Swiatek case without comparing it to that of Sinner, the world No. 1 in the men’s game.

Sinner tested positive for clostebol on March 10 this year at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, Calif, and again on March 18, out of competition. The independent tribunals of the ITIA determined the now 23-year-old Italian bore “no fault or negligence” for the positive tests, and therefore wasn’t deserving of a ban. But all this only became public at the conclusion of the ITIA’s investigations and hearings in mid-August.

There wasn’t much transparency there either, and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has since challenged and appealed the ruling to the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS), arguing that Sinner’s level of culpability should be upgraded to “no significant fault or negligence”, which would leave him facing a ban of up to two years.

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Jannik Sinner’s doping case explained: What WADA appeal means and what is at stake for tennis

Through it all though, Sinner never explained anything to the public. He didn’t have to. He successfully appealed two provisional suspensions quickly enough to avoid missing any tournaments. Still, when the ITIA announced the details of the Sinner investigation and its ruling, much of the tennis-watching public felt like people had put one over on them.

That’s not good for anyone.

Swiatek repeatedly talked about the matter coming to a close in her video statement. Yet it’s hard to believe it has.

She will absolutely face more questions when the 2025 season begins in Australia in late December — about the doping violation, but also about why she didn’t tell us what was really keeping her off the court. So too will tennis authorities, about how a system which they say is working as designed can create situations in which so many people feel left in the dark.

 (Top photo: Robert Prange / Getty Images)