Week 15 saw the Tigers and Fighting Irish resting up for their rematch next week in the ACC Championship Game but that did not mean that there wasn’t college football to watch and talk about.
There were games that came down to the wire and others that saw cleats helping to cause a huge upset loss. Let’s take a look at some of the good, the bad, and the ugly from this week in college football.
The Good:
Coastal Carolina
The Chanticleers avoided an upset and survived a trap game that was positioned at the perfect spot, between an upset of then No. 8 BYU and their league title game against No. 17 Louisiana-Lafayette. It took a final drive that was perfection, just like Coastal’s regular season that ended with the Chanticleers’ WR Jaivon Heiligh catching a 23-yard touchdown pass from QB Grayson McCall with 45 seconds left in the game. It gave Coastal a 42-38 lead and final score. McCall completed 24 of 29 passes for 338 yards and three touchdowns on the day. Heiligh had 11 catches for 138 yards and two TDs, including the winner.
USC (the real one)
Kedon Slovis and No. 16 Southern California continue to be masters of the fourth-quarter comeback. Slovis and the Trojans completed their third game-winning drive of the season. He found Amon-Ra St. Brown for an 8-yard touchdown pass with 16 seconds left to keep the Trojans from being upset by UCLA and getting them the 43-38 win on Saturday night. What made this even more impressive was the fact that USC trailed by 18 in the third quarter. Can the Trojans keep living on the edge? They will get another shot to remain undefeated this Friday when they host the Pac-12 championship game against Washington.
The Bad
Alabama
Alabama had one final chance to show how good they were this season. In their season finale against the Arkansas Razorbacks. They did not disappoint. After getting off to a slow start the Tide got it cranked up and rolled against the Razorbacks….BADLY. Alabama put up 443 total yards of offense and scored 52 points on Arkansas (49 unanswered). The Tide came into this game leading the series 8-7 but have now won their last seven meetings. Alabama has beaten their opponents by an average of 32.7 points this season.
The B1G
Many felt that the B1G conference’s decision to change their rules so that Ohio St would be able to play in the conference’s championship game was a bad idea. It showed that the only team they cared about was the Buckeyes but that did not stop them from voting to do away with the six game minimum they originally said would be needed to get into the championship game. This came after they found out that Michigan was going to have to cancel their game with Ohio St and the Buckeyes were then left with only five games played.
The Ugly
Miami
This was a team that was in the race for a spot in the ACC championship game up until last weekend. You wouldn’t be able to tell it Saturday though. No. 17 North Carolina made program, ACC, and NCAA FBS history in its dominant 62-26 win over No. 10 Miami. Tarheel running back duo, Javonte Williams and Michael Carter, rushed for a combined 544 yards, setting an NCAA FBS record for most yards by two players on the same team. Williams, who had three touchdowns against the Hurricanes, is now the program’s touchdown record holder with 22 for the season. This was not even close to a championship game performance by the Hurricanes and they looked as though they didn’t want to be there and were just going through the motions.
Florida
No. 6 Florida lost in a huge upset to LSU 37-34 on Saturday night thanks to a last-minute field goal that was made possible only because a Gators defender threw a cleat, resulting in a personal foul penalty that kept the drive alive. Yes, you read that correctly. The Tigers were stopped on third down late in the fourth quarter when WR Kole Taylor caught a pass 6 yards short of the first-down marker, forcing what would have definitely been a punt but Gator CB Marco Wilson ripped off Taylor’s shoe and threw it down the field. This drew multiple flags for an unsportsmanlike penalty and continued the LSU drive. Six plays later, PK Cade York hit the 57-yard, game-winning field goal with 23 seconds remaining.
