The 17 plays that swung the SEC Championship Game

The SEC Championship Game was very close, even by the standards of one-score games. It was exciting throughout because big moment after big moment kept happening. There were some wide swings in both teams’ favor.

I went through the game counted 17 individual plays or sequences of plays and decisions that had material impact on the final score. I’m talking things that gave teams points, extended drives that finished in points, or effectively took points off the board. I’m not referring to the technicality that any play can be a scoring play if a guy gets loose, or even run-of-the-mill third down conversions or stops.

I did my best to add up all of the swings to see if these critical plays in their totality changed the final outcome. Let’s dive in.

Plays that hurt Alabama

Let’s count up the bonus points in the good guys’ favor.

The first half didn’t have too many of these go UF’s way. Alabama was up three scores at the half for a reason.

The second play of the Gators’ first drive saw Kyle Trask and Dameon Pierce fumble the mesh point. The ball bounced directly forward in a way that allowed Trask to fall on it. That’s either a three or seven point swing away from the Tide because it happened well into Florida territory. That early in the game it probably saved a touchdown, as UF’s defense didn’t have many answers yet, but it at least prevented a field goal.

I count Trask’s 51-yard TD to Kadarius Toney as one of these plays because it is a hard throw to make and directly put points on the board. Toney’s almost-fumble right before the half also was a seven-point swing in the Gators’ favor. He was down, but only just.

The second half accounting begins with another 50-yard touchdown, this one to Trevon Grimes. It took an NFL throw and catch over a future NFL corner to pull it off.

UF’s fourth-down stop at least took three points off the board for the Tide since they were in Gator territory. It was a close one, and UF only stopped it by switching up its defense of the mesh passing concept from what it did in the first half. The other second half stop came about in large part to LT Alex Leatherwood’s holding penalty for tackling Zachary Carter on a run play, so it goes in the pile as well. It also took at least three points off the board due to where it happened.

One of the biggest plays came on Jacob Copeland’s fumble on the first play of the next drive. Five Bama players had a better shot at recovering it than any Gators initially, but the ball squirted out and Nay’Quan Wright got it. It saved another three points at the least, and it enabled the Gators to drive down and score on a Wright TD carry. That play was a ten-point swing at minimum.

Add it all up, and a conservative estimate is that these plays had a 44 or 48-point effect in Florida’s favor against Alabama.

Plays that hurt Florida

The count against Florida begins with the offsides penalty on 3rd & 10 on the Crimson Tide’s opening drive. Alabama never converted a third down longer than seven yards, and it’d go on to get a touchdown. That’s seven points Bama’s way.

The forced fumble after Trey Dean’s pick was an obvious one of these major inflection points. It swung the game another seven points to Alabama.

Kyle Trask overthrew Justin Shorter on a deep ball down the near sideline. It would’ve been a touchdown if complete, but it was just a bit too far. UF ended up kicking a field goal on that drive, so that’s four points taken away from the Gators. This play is one of the main reasons I counted the two long touchdown passes as swing plays in Florida’s favor above.

The Gators later got a stop on a 3rd & 3, but Carter had a hands-to-the-face penalty that gave Bama the first down anyway. I assign three points to that play since it kept the drive alive. Later on the same series, Jaydon Hill missed an open-field tackle on Najee Harris that would’ve stopped Bama four yards short on 3rd & 6. Maybe they go for it on 4th & 4 from the 5-yard-line, but early in the second quarter the conventional wisdom says to kick. This one was another four points.

On Bama’s next drive, UF got a stop inside Crimson Tide territory on 3rd & 7, but tempo allowed the offense to snap the ball before Kyree Campbell got all the way to the sideline on a substitution. They picked up the first down after the penalty and eventually got a touchdown, so that’s another seven points.

With 1:15 to go in the first half, Florida snapped the ball with 19 seconds on the play clock on 1st & Goal from the 1-yard-line and scored. That decision gave Bama enough time to engineer a touchdown drive with a timeout to spare. Just bleeding the extra 18 seconds off the clock might’ve been enough to prevent a score. That’s seven more points Alabama’s way.

The next one of these doesn’t come until the fourth quarter when Alabama strip-sacked Trask and picked up the ball ten yards from the end zone. The defense held and forced a field goal, so that’s three points the Tide’s way.

Finally, Mullen burned a timeout to run a two-point conversion play after what ended up being Florida’s final touchdown. That left the Gators with only one left with 2:07 to go, which basically meant they had to get the onside kick to have a real shot at scoring again. The small advantage gained by going for two at that time was drastically outweighed by the importance of keeping the timeout. Once indecision or chaos or whatever it was prevented them from getting a play off in time, they should’ve taken a delay of game penalty and kicked the extra point. Mullen at least acknowledged this mistake after the game.

That timeout, plus not recovering the onside kick, plus the final sack in desperation time was a real chance at seven points taken away from Florida.

Add all of these up, and you get something in the neighborhood of a 49 point swing against UF.

Final accounting

Well, 49 points away from Florida and 44 or 48 away from Alabama adds up to a one or five-point margin depending on how you count it. You might count it a different way yet than I did and get a different amount.

If anything, I undercounted the points removed from Alabama and overcounted the ones removed from the Gators. The advanced stats showed that the Tide was the better team, but UF wasn’t far behind. They’re commensurate with a one-score game in favor of the Tide.

What this study here shows is that there were an enormous number of critical swing plays, and somehow they ended up applying to both teams about evenly. Change and handful of these and you can get anything from an Alabama blowout to a Florida win by a couple of scores. It’s hard to ask for more from an exciting game, albeit one where the wrong team won.

David Wunderlich
David Wunderlich is a born-and-raised Gator and a proud Florida alum. He has been writing about Florida and SEC football since 2006. He currently lives in Naples Italy, at least until the Navy stations his wife elsewhere. You can follow him on Twitter @Year2