TIDE ROLLS PAST IRISH, INTO FINAL
Alabama advances to face Ohio State
ARLINGTON, TEXAS » Alabama rolled into another College Football Playoff championship game.
DeVonta Smith caught three of fellow Heisman Trophy finalist Mac Jones’ four touchdown passes, Najee Harris ran for 125 yards with a high-hurdling highlight and top-ranked Alabama beat No. 4 Notre Dame 31-14 in the relocated Rose Bowl on Friday to reach its fifth CFP title game.
While the location for this Rose Bowl was truly untraditional, the Crimson Tide (12- 0, No. 1 CFP) playing for the national title is a common occurrence in seven seasons of the CFP.
“I don’t think there’s anything quite like the Rose Bowl, the tradition, the setting, the mountains. It’s just a phenomenal experience ... which our players had gotten that opportunity,” coach Nick Saban said.
But Saban and the Tide will take yet another win in the home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, which the coach called one of college football’s finest venues, and moving on in the playoff.
Notre Dame (10-2, No. 4 CFP), in football’s final four for only the second time, has lost seven consecutive New Year’s Six games since 2000.
Alabama led 14- 0 after scoring the first two times it had the ball, including an 97-yard drive on which Harris leaped over 6-foot cornerback Nick McCloud just after crossing the line of scrimmage, landed on both feet and then sprinted for a 53-yard gain before getting run out of bounds.
“I actually try to teach him not to do it, and it didn’t work,” Saban said, laughing. “Anyway, for a big guy, it’s pretty amazing that he can do that.”
Jones, who completed 25 of 30 passes for 297 yards, threw a 12-yard TD pass to tight end Jahleel Billingsley on the next play.
That touchdown came between drives when Smith, who has 16 touchdown catches in his last seven games, turned short passes into scores of 26 and 34 yards. Smith finished with seven catches for 130 yards, added a nifty toe-tapping 7-yarder in the front corner of the end zone right on the pylon in the middle of the third quarter.
The Crimson Tide earned a spot in the Jan. 11 championship game in Miami against No. 3 Ohio State, which defeated No. 2 Clemson 49-28 at the Sugar Bowl on Friday night. Alabama missed the CFP last year for the only time since the four-time playoff debuted at the end of the 2014 season.
CFP officials moved the Rose Bowl about 1,400 miles because of COVID-19 restrictions in California that would have kept family — or any fans — from attending the game at its normal home in Pasadena. There was a limited capacity crowd of 18,373 at AT&T Stadium, just a bit higher than attendance for the Cotton Bowl game played there two days earlier.