College football season has just one game remaining as Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota and the No. 2 Oregon Ducks get ready to square off in the national championship game with No. 4 Ohio State and third-string quarterback Cardale Jones. The inaugural College Football Playoff and the accompanying bowls that surrounded it were just as exciting as any other year. The final AP Poll will not be released until after the title game Jan. 12 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Tx. but there will be huge shake ups from top to bottom.
No. 2 Oregon beats No. 3 Florida State, hands Jameis Winston first career loss in Rose Bowl rout
Jameis Winston and Florida State entered their Rose Bowl matchup against Oregon undefeated on the year and riding a 29-game win streak but at the end of the day, the story was entirely about Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota and an Oregon offense that posted 41 points in the second half against the Seminoles, including 34 unanswered points to end the game, to cruise to the title game after a 59-20 rout. Mariota finished 26-of-36 passing for 338 yards, two touchdowns and one interception, and he received a good deal of help in the running game from Thomas Tyner, who carried the ball 13 times for 124 yards and two touchdowns.
Winston seemed baffled by the Oregon defense throughout most of the game and finished just 29-of-45 for 348 yards and one touchdown. The most telling stat for last year’s Heisman winner, though, came from his two turnovers, one interception and a fumble. Of Florida State’s first six drives in the second half, five ended in turnovers, including a fumble that was returned for a touchdown.
The national championship game will kickoff Jan. 12 at 8:30 p.m and will feature a hungry Duck squad seeking postseason glory that appears to be peaking at the right time.
No. 4 Ohio State Upsets No. 1 Alabama behind Third-String Quarterback
Cardale Jones has started two games for the Buckeyes in 2014-15 and now he will have an opportunity to start a third. Coming off a 59-0 slaughter against Wisconsin in the Big Ten championship, Ohio State knocked off the No. 1 Crimson Tide 42-35 in what was arguably head coach Urban Meyer’s greatest coaching performance during his brief stint in Columbus. The Buckeyes racked up 537 total yards, including 281 yards on the ground, against one of the nation’s most vaunted defenses and Jones turned the ball over just once on the day on his way to a second career victory.
Alabama hung with Ohio State throughout the game, but was eventually done in by the three interceptions thrown by quarterback Blake Sims. One of those interceptions was returned for a touchdown and turned out to be the difference in the game. Although down two touchdowns with just 3:24 to go in the game, the Crimson Tide marched down the field to come within one score with 1:59 remaining. After a failed onside kick attempt, the Alabama defense held firm and forced a three-and-out to get the ball back to its offense with 1:33 to go. Unfortunately for the Crimson Tide faithful, the offense could only reach just past midfield before Sims was intercepted in the end zone as time expired.
Despite the loss, Alabama will likely finish inside the top four in the final poll, but the end of the season was sour in the Sugar Bowl once again for head coach Nick Saban and his team.
Powerful SEC West goes woeful 2-5 in bowl games
The division that was argued throughout the year to be the strongest division in all of college football did not fair well when it came to the postseason. Despite sending all seven teams to bowl games—from 12-1 Alabama to 6-6 Arkansas—the SEC West finished just 2-5 in the postseason and those two wins came from the two teams sitting at the bottom of the division standings, Texas A&M and Arkansas.
As mentioned before, Alabama was dropped in the national semifinal by Ohio State. No. 7 Mississippi State fell to No. 12 Georgia Tech 49-34 in the Orange Bowl, No. 9 Ole Miss was slaughtered 42-3 by No. 6 TCU in the Peach Bowl, No. 19 Auburn fell to No. 18 Wisconsin 34-31 in the Outback Bowl and No. 23 LSU was beaten by unranked Notre Dame 31-28 in the Music City Bowl.
The silver lining for the West was Texas A&M’s 45-37 victory against West Virginia in the Liberty Bowl and Arkansas’s 31-7 beat down of Texas in the Texas Bowl. Although it wasn’t all bad for the SEC as the much maligned SEC East went 5-0 in its bowl games. Georgia, Missouri, Florida, Tennessee and South Carolina all earned postseason victories for the conference, many are questioning the hype given to the SEC West after its atrocious bowl season.
Pac-12 finishes with best record in bowl games among power-five conferences, ACC Finishes 4-7 in Bowl Games
In addition to having a team in the national title game, Pac-12 teams performed, as a whole, better than any other conference, finishing 6-2. The SEC finished with one more win total than the Pac-12 did but also had three more losses. Aside from Oregon’s win against Florida State, the Pac-12 added wins from Arizona State, Stanford, UCLA, USC and Utah with losses from only Arizona and Washington.
The ACC, on the other hand, did not fare as well. After sending 11 teams to the postseason, the ACC came away with just four wins and will not have a stake in the national title game as many expected at the beginning of the season. Clemson, N.C. State, Georgia Tech and Virginia Tech were the only victorious ACC squads while a laundry list consisting of Florida State, Louisville, Boston College, Duke, North Carolina, Pittsburgh and Miami all went home without a bowl win.
The most stunning loss of all for the ACC came in Pittsburgh’s matchup against Houston. The Panthers were up 31-6 with about 14 minutes to go in the game before the Cougars mounted a furious comeback that included four touchdowns, two successfully recovered onside kicks and a two-point conversion for the win instead of an extra point that would have sent the game into overtime.
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