Final College Football Playoff predictions bode well for LSU, I’m hopping on the Lane Train and speculating about Mike Norvell’s future at Florida State.
LSU makes their case to be the new No. 1, Ohio State avoids the upset, Ole Miss boards the Lane Train and Florida State find their new coach. It’s been a crazy weekend in college football but now it’s time to make sense of the madness and figure out what it means for the College Football Playoff and bowl season. Let’s whip it around from conference to conference and wrap up with Ole Miss and FSU finding their new coaches and how excited their fans should be about the hires.
Pac-12 playoff problems persist
The Pac-12 just can’t help itself.
Just when the league had a chance to snap their playoff drought, it disappeared before we even got to Saturday. Utah needed a win vs. Oregon to effectively clinch a spot in the playoff but was shutout in the first half and failed to take advantage in their biggest game in years. It’s hard to say Utah choked because Oregon is a pretty good team who was a last-second loss vs. Auburn in the season opener from being in the playoff themselves. However, the way in which they lost was utterly depressing and patented Pac-12 disappointment.
Tyler Huntley had only thrown two interceptions all year but threw two in the Pac-12 Championship Game, including one in the end zone in the first quarter. Utah also was 0-4 on fourth down attempts and just couldn’t establish any sort of momentum all night.
Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott should be working diligently to expand the playoff to eight teams otherwise the Pac-12 is going to miss it year after year if this trend of playoff problems persists.
Jalen Hurts has one of the most insane college careers ever
Who had Jalen Hurts in the College Football Playoff and Alabama watching from home? I had half of that with the dream of seeing Hurts playing against his former team in the playoff but that dream died months ago. The dream is still alive for Hurts to get redemption in the National Championship Game if he can lead the Sooners to a Peach Bowl win over LSU who I project to get the No. 1 seed.
But consider the bigger picture for Hurts who has one of the craziest college football careers of all time. Hurts was the first freshman starting quarterback at Alabama and put up sick numbers en route to the title game that he almost won if not for Deshaun Watson heroics. He follows that up by getting back to the title game before he is benched by Tua Tagovailoa who wins the title for Bama and unseats Hurts as the starter. Hurts, as a backup, comes off the bench to lead Alabama to a comeback win vs. Georgia in the SEC Championship Game after Tua was injured. Now, he should be a Heisman Trophy finalist after transferring to Oklahoma and is the first and perhaps only quarterback to lead two different teams to the College Football Playoff.
What are the odds of that ever happening again? Even in the advent of the transfer portal era, it’s hard to envision someone walking a similar path as Hurts. Truly a special player and person who will have at least one more game to cement his legacy as an all-time legend.
LSU makes the case to be No. 1 in playoff rankings
The Heisman race was over a month ago for Joe Burrow who added four more touchdowns and 349 yards and even caught a pass from himself, in the SEC Championship Game win vs. Georgia. It was a dominant showing by the Tigers who won 37-10 and it wasn’t even really that close. Georgia couldn’t get anything going and LSU left 14-17 points on the field. But what they showed was enough to prove they should get the No. 1 ranking by the College Football Playoff committee on Sunday.
Ed Orgeron’s team has beat five AP Top 10 teams and their win over No. 2 Alabama in Tuscaloosa remains the most impressive win of the season. Their defense was knocked in November which dropped them from No. 1 to No. 2 but the way Dave Aranda’s unit has played vs. Georgia and Texas A&M in their last two games is proof they’re getting healthy at the right time and playing their best ball.
This isn’t a knock on Ohio State, but rather a testimony about LSU that they have traversed the toughest path to get to this point and should be rewarded for it. The reward is avoiding Clemson in the first round and getting Oklahoma in the Peach Bowl.
Clemson’s season begins now
You’ve heard it all year but the ACC stinks and it’s been the biggest knock on Clemson all year. The Tigers haven’t had to break a sweat into the fourth quarter since their one-point win vs. North Carolina in what feels like six months ago. Clemson hasn’t had to turn the light on as Ohio State did vs. Penn State, Michigan and Wisconsin to close their year. And they didn’t get tested all year like LSU who beat five AP Top 10 teams already this year.
Can Dabo Swinney and his team flip the proverbial switch and turn it on when the playoffs begin in three weeks and they have to play Ohio State?
There isn’t a single doubt in my mind that they can.
This is a championship team. Trevor Lawrence, Travis Etienne, Tee Higgins, Justyn Ross, Isaiah Simmons and the rest of the team have been in this moment before and know what is required to prepare and win in these games. That doesn’t mean I’m predicting Clemson to go back-to-back, but all year-long, I’ve judged Clemson by how they play and not who they play.
There may not be a team playing better on both sides of the ball than Clemson and there may not be a player playing better than Lawrence, who still has not lost a game in college.
Ohio State needs to get Justin Fields healthy
Ohio State got off to a slow start vs. Wisconsin in the Big Ten Championship Game. They were just fashionably late as they turned it on in the second half with 27 unanswered points to come back from a 21-7 halftime deficit. Wisconsin has a great defense and Jonathan Taylor torched the Buckeyes on the ground, but it looked like Justin Fields wasn’t quite himself.
The MCL sprain Fields aggravated in the win vs. Michigan, after previously hurting it vs. Penn State, looked to affect him in the first half. Perhaps it was the knee brace he wore that made him uncomfortable. Perhaps it was just Wisconsin’s defense. In any event, the three weeks until Ohio State plays in the College Football Playoff should be plenty of time for Fields to get his MCL healthy and restore that spring and explosiveness he plays with.
The slow start probably cost the Buckeyes the No. 1 seed in the playoff rankings so they get the dreaded matchup with Clemson rather than Oklahoma in the semifinal. I’m not making a prediction, but I hope it’s a bit closer than the last time these two met in a bowl game.
Ole Miss boards the Lane Train
The reports broke on Friday night that Lane Kiffin would be the next head coach at Ole Miss. But he still had to coach Florida Atlantic in the Conference USA Championship Game on Saturday afternoon so an official announcement had to wait. That let the Ole Miss football Twitter account tease the big news all day to the delight of fans, and Baby Yoda stans. I think I’ve played this clip about 50 times and I crack up every single time. This is great social media and I think it’s a great hire. Even if it’s a disaster, it should be entertaining.
I don’t think it’ll be a total disaster where the Lane Train is derailed, but it’s a tough division to win and historically it’s been a tough program to win unless you commit NCAA violations, which is what Chris Kiffin did on Hugh Freeze’s staff in 2017. That should be fun to talk about. But this should be a fun infusion of personality and a legit coach who is more than an alum who was needed to stabilize the program in the wake of Freeze’s drama.
The Rebels will be able to score. FAU dominated C-USA the last two years and he led Alabama to prolific numbers before leaving for the FAU job. He will be a little unorthodox and do things his own way, but that’s exactly what Ole Miss needs. This is going to be so fun. He makes Ole Miss worth watching again. Plus, he gets to see his old boss Nick Saban every year. Inject that into my veins.
Mike Norvell leads Memphis to AAC title, takes FSU job
The third time was the charm for Mike Norvell who led Memphis to the American Championship after losing to UCF in the AAC Championship Game the previous two seasons. The win clinches a berth in the Cotton Bowl for Memphis but Norvell may not be there. Norvell is the new head coach at Florida State and his availability to coach the game is in question. P.J. Fleck and Scott Frost coached their Group of 5 teams in the New Year’s Six bowl game despite taking a new job. It would be a cool story for Norvell to finish it out, but even if he doesn’t, this is a great hire for the Seminoles.
It’s been a rough couple of years for Florida State under Willie Taggart the last two and the rapid demise of the Jimbo Fisher era. I’m not predicting the Seminoles to knock off Clemson in the ACC next year, but they will be rapidly improved on offense next year and should be back to being in the Top 25 on an annual basis by 2022. It has the chance to be a quick turnaround but at the same time, it’s important to practice patience. The most important thing will be winning over the fans and the high school coaches to keep that pipeline strong to Tallahassee.
Give Norvell two years and he’ll have Florida State back to national prominence.
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