Tide roll over Aggies to remain unbeaten

TUSCALOOSA, ALA.— Jonathan Allen returned a fumble 29 yards for a touchdown late in the third quarter to help top-ranked Alabama beat No. 6 Texas A&M 33-14.

The Crimson Tide (8-0, 5-0 Southeastern Conference) moved on as the powerhouse league’s last unbeaten team, getting yet another in a long string of defensive scores.

Allen, a lineman, scooped up the ball after Ryan Anderson knocked it loose from Keith Ford to finally build a cushion over the Aggies (6-1, 4-1), who led 14-13 well into the third.

It was 20-14 when Allen extended Alabama’s streak to 10 games with a score on defence or special teams, half the duration of a winning streak now at 20 going into an open date.

Alabama’s freshman quarterback Jalen Hurts then galloped 37 yards for another score, stepping out of a defender’s grasp and making a nifty move to get past another. The Tide were rolling again, a powerful encore to easy wins over ranked Tennessee and Arkansas teams.

Alabama racked up five sacks of Trevor Knight, the quarterback who engineered Oklahoma’s Sugar Bowl upset over Alabama as a redshirt freshman with a 348-yard, fourtouchdown performance. He passed for 164 and ran for 24 in the semirematch.

Hurts passed for 166 yards and rushed for 93 more, throwing for a pair of touchdowns while getting intercepted twice. Damien Harris rushed 17 times for 126 yards.

No. 3 Michigan 41, Illinois 8: Wilton Speight threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns in three quarters before watching Michigan finish off Illinois. The Wolverines (7-0, 4-0 Big Ten) were leading 34-0 in the fourth quarter when Jim Harbaugh put backup quarterback John O’Korn in the game and rested Speight. No. 5 Washington 41, Oregon State17: Jake Browning threw three touchdowns passes to give him 26 for the season, added another rushing TD, and Washington used a big first half to roll past Oregon State. The Huskies (7-0, 4-0 Pac-12) won their 10th straight, a streak that started with a victory at Oregon State last season. It is Washington’s longest win streak since winning 12 straight in 2000-01.

Browning was 14 of 28 for 291yards. No. 7 Louisville 54, North Carolina State13: Lamar Jackson broke Louisville’s single-season record with a hand in four first-half touchdowns, and the Cardinals had three interceptions. Jackson threw three touchdown passes and had a 36-yard scoring run, giving him 34 TDs with five games to play. No. 8 Nebraska 27, Purdue 14: Tommy Armstrong Jr. accounted for 303 yards of offence and two touchdowns, and Nebraska came back from a four-point halftime deficit to beat Purdue and improve to 7-0.