Midway through the first quarter, already with a quick lead on the road, North Texas sophomore punt returner Keegan Brewer fielded a punt and stood on his own 10 yard line. No, really, he just stood there and waited for Arkansas players to get around him. What happened next is as awesome as it was confusing for the host Razorbacks that Saturday. Instead of tackling the 5-foot-11 return man, who was standing with just one blocker within 10 yards, the Razorbacks started to jog off the field because they thought it was a fair catch. However, the whistle never blew and Brewer housed the punt return for a 90-yard touchdown on ESPN’s SEC Network. North Texas’ Fake Fair Catch Punt Return RELATED: “Little Giants” Fake Field Goal Brought Our Childhood Dreams to Life In a NCAA college football and NFL world filled with trick plays, this one to give the North Texas Mean Green a 14-0 lead over the SEC’s Arkansas Razorbacks at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium was absolutely brilliant. There were four Razorbacks within five yards of Brewer. There was another standing a few yards away, too. Any of them could have made a play. And when they all started heading toward their sideline, Brewer took off and had the rest of the special teams unit ready to block for him. “One of them actually asked me why [the referees] didn’t blow the whistle,” Brewer, a Corinth, Texas native, said. “I didn’t say anything. As soon as he passed me, I knew it was go time.” It’s understandable why the first half trickery worked. Everyone inside the stadium who wasn’t on the North Texas sideline thought it was a fair catch. Brewer didn’t signal for a fair catch, though, and the result is one of the greatest highlights of the week and perhaps the play of the year. The best part? North Texas dismantled Arkansas, 44-17, after beating SMU and Incarnate Word to start the season. There is no doubt the fake fair catch punt return helped head coach Seth Littrell’s Mean Green steal the momentum for the remainder of the game, too. Advertisement Could you imagine if a team like LSU, Georgia, Clemson, Oregon or even the New England Patriots pulled off something like this fair catch trick, too? This post was originally published on September 17, 2018.<doc-sep>This happened in the first quarter in today’s North Texas-Arkansas game. Arkansas punter Blake Johnson launched a low and knuckling punt to the North Texas 10 yard line, where it was fielded cleanly by Keegan Brewer, whose body language following the catch was that of a man who had no intention of attempting a return. The Arkansas punt team, having observed his apparent surrender, began making their way toward the sideline. Advertisement Only the referees and Brewer apparently were aware that he hadn’t actually signaled for a fair catch! Oh no! Oh, yes. This is a play with some stakes! Brewer’s subterfuge involves appearing to give up on a play without having actually signaled a fair catch, leaving himself vulnerable to an attentive Arkansas gunner knocking him into next week. But it worked! North Texas’s 14-point lead was extended to 17 by the end of the quarter, and they now lead 24-10 in the second quarter.<doc-sep>The North Texas Mean Green pulled off the play of the week (and possibly the year) against Arkansas on Saturday. On an Arkansas punt in the first half, UNT returner Keegan Brewster fielded the ball without signaling for a fair catch. However, he acted casual and the Hogs didn’t tackle him. After strolling past the first wave of defenders, Brewster turned on the jets and scampered untouched into the end zone: That play didn’t just happen, though. According to a story from SB Nation, special teams coordinator Matt Biagi said the Mean Green have been working on that gem for a while: “You can’t just put that in on a Wednesday and then go, ‘Hey! Trust me!’” Biagi says. So the coordinator told the returner in August, “Hey, we’re gonna start practicing this during fall camp, and I need you to trust me.” “And Keegan looked me square in the eyes and said, ‘Coach, let’s practice it until you know it’ll work.’ So instead of just practicing that once, my big thing is: don’t practice it till you get it right,” Biagi says. “Practice it till you can’t get it wrong.” It went about as perfectly as it could have on Saturday, but now teams will be waiting for it to happen again, so Brewster will have to be careful.<doc-sep>This is 100 percent the best college football play of the weekend, no doubt about it. Yes, some of the games haven’t even started yet, but that’s how stunningly brilliant, deviously cunning and jaw-droppingly incredible this is. It’s brought to you by Keegan Brewer, a wide receiver for North Texas who also returns punts for the Mean Green. Against Arkansas on Saturday, the Razorbacks punted on fourth-and-10 on North Texas’ 37-yard line, and Brewer was sitting on the 10-yard line ready for the catch. All totally normal, right? How is that possible? How is that legal? Well, something is clearly missing from this play. At no point did Brewer ever make a fair catch signal. He faked it and stood still for a moment, tricking Arkansas’ players into thinking this was the end of the play. And then he took off for a 90-yard punt-return touchdown. Sure, you can only pull this punch once, but it was perfectly executed and gave North Texas up, 14-0, in the first quarter.<doc-sep>
If you watched college football this weekend, you probably saw North Texas' wild 90-yard fake-fair catch punt return touchdown on Saturday against Arkansas. What you probably didn't know is that the architect of the play — North Texas' special teams coordinator Marty Biagi — is a Shelbyville native, who was named to the Courier Journal's 2003 all-state football team before kicking at Marshall. Watch the highlight below Biagi spoke with SB Nation to detail how the play the came together. He said it took weeks of practice, and required buy-in from not only the punt returner and blockers, but also the entire North Texas sideline. Biagi told the returner, Keegan Brewer, they were going to run the play just seconds before the first-quarter punt. "You talk about a big operation," Biagi said, according to SB Nation. "You’ve gotta have all hands on deck, because you’ve gotta have the sideline coaches, the strength staff doing a great job keeping everybody off the field, ‘cause normally what happens is the offense is ready to take the field, run on, and get everyone fired up." The result of the play was perfection. Brewer caught the ball at the 10-yard line, acting like he had signaled for a fair catch. He then took off toward the Mean Green sideline where he had a wall of eight blockers ready to escort him 90 yards to the endzone. North Texas went on to win the game 44-17. You may like:Louisville fans applaud the improved experience at Cardinal Stadium Justin Sayers: 502-582-4252; jsayers@courierjournal.com; Twitter: @_JustinSayers. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: courier-journal.com/justins.