The last final of the College Football Playoff’s four-team era will be SEC-free. Ohio State and Clemson also won’t be in the championship game. It’s the first time in the CFP’s 10-year history that the national championship game won’t feature any of those teams.
Forgive me for saying so, SEC partisans, but that’s a good thing. I’m looking forward to seeing Michigan and Washington play for the title Monday in Houston. And that’s not just because it’s something different after nine years of pretty much the same teams appearing in college football’s final game of the season.
This year’s CFP final will feature quarterbacks who are top NFL prospects, Washington’s Michael Penix Jr. and Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy. CFP semifinals losers Alabama and Texas don’t have a quarterback as good as those two. The same goes for three teams that had a case to make the CFP and were left out: Florida State, Georgia and Ohio State.
The coaches are intriguing, two. We know all about how Nick Saban and Kirby Smart run their programs like machines, and we’ve heard all their joyless platitudes. Now we’ll get a relatively unknown coach, Washington’s Kalen DeBoer, who will try to win a national championship. Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh is quirky or annoying, depending on your perspective, but he’s not boring.
This will be the first No. 1 vs. No. 2 national championship game since Clemson beat top-ranked Alabama for the 2018 title. Michigan and Washington earned it with undefeated regular seasons and hard-fought victories in the semifinals. The top-ranked Wolverines made a fourth-down stand in overtime to beat Alabama in the Rose Bowl on Monday and Washington turned back a late rally by Texas in the Sugar Bowl.
The CFP Championship game promises to be entertaining, too. The Huskies rank second nationally behind LSU in passing plays of 20 yards or more. Only two teams have allowed fewer of those plays than Michigan. Washington’s defense is weak against the run. The Wolverines have scored 36 touchdowns on the ground. Something’s got to give.
I say it will be Michigan’s pass defense. It will be difficult to prevent Penix and All-American wide receiver Rome Odunze from putting on a show. Against Texas, Penix made several accurate throws into tight spaces while piling up 430 yards on 38 attempts with two touchdowns. Odunze had six catches for 125 yards.
It was fun to watch the Huskies keep pushing the pace and throwing the ball downfield late in a tight game with high stakes.
“I think the aggressiveness is just who we are,” DeBoer said. “The drives where we kind of stalled, I know a lot of the times we just look back on it, and we were like, ‘Man, we just need to give (Penix) a chance to have the ball in his hands.’ Because he was feeling it, and his guys were making plays.”
The approach paid off. The Huskies are playing for their first national title since 1991, when they were co-champions with Miami. Washington made the 2016 CFP field, lost that Peach Bowl against Alabama and then lost at least three games in every full season from 2017-21. DeBoer, former head coach at NAIA-program Sioux Falls, has them back in elite circles.
Harbaugh has done the same thing for Michigan. The Wolverines have a storied tradition, of course. They’ve won 11 national championships, but only one since 1948. Harbaugh had to take a salary cut to keep his job in 2020. Since then, he’s won three consecutive Big Ten titles and made his third consecutive CFP field.
Harbaugh’s Wolverines finally broke through to the national title game by beating Alabama. That prompted Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel to do some gloating about the Michigan fans who wanted Harbaugh fired.
“I’m very proud of him, and I’m very happy that everybody who sent me emails and letters were wrong,” Manuel told reporters after the Rose Bowl. “Dead wrong.”
It’s possible that Manuel will have to find a replacement for Harbaugh soon. NFL Network reports that Harbaugh has yet to sign the 10-year contract offered by Manuel. The sticking point is a clause that prohibits him from seeking an NFL job for the 2024 season. Harbaugh flirted with a return to the NFL last year before returning to Michigan, but maybe this time he’s serious.
Harbaugh is worth the trouble to Michigan. A sign-stealing scandal is the latest headache. The Big Ten suspended Harbaugh three games after it found that a former analyst broke the rules against in-person scouting and use of electronic devices to decipher signals. If you think any of that will matter if Michigan wins a title, consider that Bill Belichick is still considered the NFL’s greatest coach of all time after the Patriots broke the rules against sign stealing for years.
Michigan survived the Rose Bowl against Bama. Saban credited the Wolverines for a well-played game, but that was boilerplate coach-speak. The truth is that Michigan played sloppily, but Bama was even sloppier. Saban took the blame for the loss. If he hadn’t done it, then plenty of others were ready to pin it on him because the Crimson Tide looked like a poorly coached team.
Alabama gained only 288 yards, mostly because it kept going backward. The Tide couldn’t handle Michigan’s stunts and blitzes on pass rushes while allowing six sacks. Mishandled shotgun snaps were a big problem all game. That’s why it made no sense for Alabama to try one with the game on the line in overtime.
Quarterback Jalen Milroe bobbled a low snap before trying to run four yards for a touchdown on fourth down. Multiple Michigan hit him before he could get close to the end zone. That ensured that there would be no SEC team in the national title game.
That’s OK because Michigan-Washington will be a fine finale.
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
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