I hope this edition of SRA finds you well after missing last week for the holiday. Back at it this week.
With Florida still in a holding pattern until the Orange Bowl tonight, I want to go over a couple of things from the semifinal games on Saturday. The upshot is the Tigers vs. Tigers, Death Valley vs. Death Valley matchup that is a lazy headline writer’s dream.
LSU people were telling media members in the lead up to the Peach Bowl that, based on their studies, Oklahoma was about the fifth-best team they would face this year after (in alphabetical order) Alabama, Auburn, Florida, and Georgia. On Andy Staples’ podcast after the game, he said someone in the program wasn’t sure if Oklahoma was even a top-15 team.
The latter point might be a bit of a stretch. The Sooners didn’t do anything to refute that with how flat they came out and how poorly they performed overall, but over the course of the whole season they really were a top team. Not the top team, but one of the better ones in the country.
I would caution everyone against extrapolating too much from LSU’s wipeout win over Oklahoma. This year’s Tiger team is one of the most dominant I’ve ever seen, and its only weakness is its defense losing focus once the offense gets up by a lot. It also went through stretches where some of its best players on that side of the ball were injured, so they weren’t at full strength as they are now.
Joe Burrow is setting records typically only touched by Run ‘n Shoot or Air Raid quarterbacks despite playing in a decidedly pro-style offense that 100% isn’t either of those. It’s not normal. Furthermore, LSU thoroughly outclassed Oklahoma on the line of scrimmage, and that’s probably what the LSU guy talking to Staples was referring to.
That’s the real takeaway because it fits a larger pattern. There are two Power 5 conferences that have a harder time finding top linemen than the other three do. When Alabama rendered Washington inert a few years back in the Playoff, you could tell from the jump that the Tide wouldn’t have any real trouble because of its line play. The same thing happened on Saturday in Atlanta.
The Pac-12 and Big 12 have lineman pipeline problems. California doesn’t make them as big and skilled as the South does, and in the Great Plains it’s no longer 1982 when you could stash a bunch of big cornfed galoots on the scout team and let time and competition tell you which ones actually had athleticism under there. There’s a reason why Matt Rhule has gotten Baylor so good so quickly: he’s one of the few in that conference that invests in line play like his job depends on it. Same for Mario Cristobal at Oregon.
Not that Oklahoma is a great distance off. Their new DC Alex Grinch is sharp and did quite a lot with what he had to work with. It was just two years ago that the Sooners forced Georgia to play their Big 12-style game in the Rose Bowl and nearly pulled out the win. But they will need to get a lot better on the lines or else a semifinal game will become their permanent ceiling.
As for the other game, you knew there was trouble with Ohio State early. Kicking two field goals from inside the opponent 5-yard-line is always a red flag. It’s a manifestation of the adage, “kick early, go for it late”, one that conservative coaches and commentators love to cite.
The first one is more forgivable, as it came on the game’s opening drive. Clemson answered to a degree with a drive to get just close enough to miss a 49-yard field goal, but OSU responded with a long touchdown run on the next play. The Tigers’ next two drives were six plays and punt followed by a three-and-out. The Buckeye defense was locked in, and likely nothing bad was going to happen if they went for it on 4th-and-goal from the five. But, Ryan Day kicked the field goal anyway.
I get kicking the field goal on 4th-and-15 from the 16-yard-line, as Ohio State did on the next drive, but that came after a false start and three incompletions (including a bad drop). That put them up only 16-0, and you knew after dominating so much it was precarious only to have a two-score lead.
From that point on, Clemson outscored Ohio State 29-7. OSU had 99 more yards in the contest, although CU had an edge in yards per play, but the Buckeyes committed two turnovers to the Tigers’ zero. If you don’t put a team as good as Clemson away when you have the chance, it’s bad news.
Prior to bowls commencing, my score picking formula liked Clemson 38-30 over LSU. It underestimated how well LSU and how badly Oklahoma would play, calculating a 45-34 Tiger win for the Peach Bowl. It wasn’t too far off with a projection of a 33-30 Ohio State win; Clemson scored 29, and OSU, with two touchdowns instead of field goals inside the CU five, would’ve had 31.
I’ll rerun the national title game projection after all the other bowls are complete to incorporate more data, but I doubt the outcome will change even if the score definitely will. As much as I love the formula and as well as it’s doing straight up this year (15-6 in just picking winners), I think I’ll overrule it and expect an LSU win. Clemson is for real, but it’s not otherworldly as Burrow and that offense has been.
If it was last year’s Clemson defense, I’d have more doubts. Right now, though, it’s gotta be LSU.