Louisville football Coach Steve Kragthorpe called his West Virginia counterpart, Rich Rodriguez, yesterday to settle the spitting incident that allegedly occured in Thursday’s game. Kragthorpe said his player, linebacker Preston Smith, did not spit but that something happened as Smith and WVU quarterback Patrick White trash-talked. Whatever it was that happened was then misconstrued by White.

Rodriguez was content with the explanation, so much so that he declined Kragthorpe’s offer to speak with White himself to clear the air, and said he had no choice but to move on because there was no evidence to support or deny the claims made by White and Smith.

“You couldn’t really tell on film. You could tell they were in eachother’s face a bit, but you couldn’t see anything beyond that.”

We’ll be the judge of that…

Here is the best video I can find. (By the way, could someone teach me how to embed the video? I’m lost.)

Smith is No. 6 and he starts on the right side of the screen and motions that Louisville got the football. He leaves the picture and re-enters at the 10-second mark the top of the screen. At the same time, White appears on the right side of the screen. At 14 seconds, White does something to get Smith’s attention and the two then get face-to-face. At 18 seconds, Smith’s head snaps forward and White rocks back. White then taps the back judge and points to Smith, who is walking away.

What hasn’t been mentioned is a possible witness, No. 83, Tito Gonzales. At 14 seconds, he tries to intervene when White and Smith start talking. After Smith’s “motion,” Gonazales takes his mouthpiece out to talk to the back judge and points at Smith. Why is that?

And if you get the feeling this whole incident and explanation is vaguely familiar, you are correct.