Extra point

Extra point

In American and Canadian football, the convert, conversion, try, extra point, point after touchdown, point-after try or PAT is the act of lining up to attempt a one-point field goal, immediately following a touchdown. If the kick goes through the uprights, the team gets an additional point for their touchdown, bringing their total for that score from six points to seven.

The extra point is among the oldest parts of the game of gridiron football and dates to its soccer roots. In its earliest days, scoring a touchdown was not the primary objective but a means of getting a free kick at the goal (hence why the name "try," more commonly associated with rugby today, is still in American football rule books), and thus while a field goal would be 5 points, a touchdown would only be one point and the conversion would be worth four (for a total of five). By the start of the 20th century, touchdowns had become more important and the roles of touchdown and kick were reversed. By this time the point value for the after-touchdown kick had reduced to its current one-point value while the touchdown was now worth five. (This later increased to six points in American football in 1912 and in Canadian football in 1956.)

If two extra points are needed or desired, a two-point conversion (touchdown conversion) try may be attempted by running or passing from scrimmage instead of the extra point kick. A successful touchdown conversion brings the score's total to eight.

In the National Football League, the scrimmage for point after touchdown takes place from the two-yard line. In American high school and college football, it is from the three-yard line. In Canadian football it is from the five-yard line. The game clock does not run during an extra-point attempt, except for some rare circumstances at the high-school level.

In the NFL and American high school football (in most states), the play is over once either the attempt fails or the defense takes possession. In many other levels of football, including the Canadian Football League and American college football, the play continues until the ball is otherwise dead. This allows the defense to recover the ball to return it to the opponent's end zone for two points. Two states, Texas and Massachusetts, play high school football under NCAA rules and thus allow the defense to score on an extra point attempt.

In the NFL, the attempt for extra point(s) is required after a touchdown scored during the regulation (i.e., not overtime), because points are used for some tiebreakers in the standings. Rarely, this can result in such an attempt having to be made at the end of the game when it cannot change the outcome of the game. If the game is in sudden death overtime, the extra-point attempt is omitted if the winning score is a touchdown. In American high school and college football, it's likewise omitted following a touchdown on the game's final play if six points were enough to win or if the scoring team was already ahead.

The World Football League and XFL eliminated the extra-point kick in their short lives and only allowed a one-point scrimmage play, although the XFL later implemented a variable system that allowed increasing point values for increasing the distance to the end zone on the attempt for its playoffs.

External links

* [http://users.bestweb.net/~robgood/football/try.txt History of the point(s) after touchdown] .

References


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Extra-point — Marquer un touchdown donne droit : soit à botter une transformation (extra point en anglais ) qui rapporte un point (faite au pied), soit à une conversion qui consiste à atteindre de nouveau la end zone, soit par la passe ou à la course: si… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Extra Point — is a twice daily, two minute segment on ESPN Radio. The AM edition airs Monday through Saturday at various times between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m. ET, and the PM edition airs Monday through Friday between 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. ET. On the segments, ESPN… …   Wikipedia

  • extra point — n. CONVERSION (sense 3) …   English World dictionary

  • Extra point — Marquer un touchdown donne droit : soit à botter une transformation (extra point en anglais) qui rapporte un point (faite au pied), soit à une conversion qui consiste à atteindre de nouveau la end zone, soit par la passe ou à la course: si… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • extra point — noun in American football a point awarded for a successful place kick following a touchdown • Syn: ↑point after, ↑point after touchdown • Topics: ↑American football, ↑American football game • Hypernyms: ↑conversion, ↑ …   Useful english dictionary

  • extra point — noun Date: circa 1949 a point gained on a conversion in football …   New Collegiate Dictionary

  • extra point — noun after a touchdown, an attempt to kick the ball through the goal posts to gain another point …   Wiktionary

  • extra point — Football. conversion (def. 13). * * * …   Universalium

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  • point — See: AT SWORDS POINTS, AT THE POINT OF, BESIDE THE POINT, BOILING POINT, CASE IN POINT, COME TO THE POINT, EXTRA POINT, MAKE A POINT, ON THE POINT OF, SORE SPOT or SORE POINT, STRETCH A POINT or STRAIN A POINT, TALKING POINT …   Dictionary of American idioms

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