In the most dramatic game of the first 12-team College Football Playoff so far, No. 5 seed Texas squandered a 16-point lead, missed two field goals in the final two minutes of regulation and still somehow escaped with a 39-31 double-overtime win over No. 4 seed Arizona State in the Peach Bowl, securing a spot in the semifinals.
The Longhorns will return to their home state to play in the Cotton Bowl in Arlington, Texas, on Jan. 10, where they will face the winner of Oregon and Ohio State’s rematch in the Rose Bowl quarterfinal.
Arizona State got the ball first in overtime and found the end zone on a bruising run from star tailback Cam Skattebo, who was hoisted across the goal line by his teammate, right guard Kyle Scott. After an incomplete pass, a run for no gain and a two-yard completion to open their possession, the Longhorns were called for a false start that left them facing a fourth-and-13 from the 28, but quarterback Quinn Ewers found Matthew Golden behind the Sun Devils defense for a season-saving touchdown.
Ewers hit Gunnar Helm for a touchdown on the first play of the second overtime, then found Golden again in the corner of the end zone for the two-point conversion. Arizona State drove to the Texas 10 on its possession, but Longhorns safety Andrew Mukuba picked off quarterback Sam Leavitt just in front of the goal line.
Finally, an expanded CFP thriller
So much of the talk coming into the quarterfinals was how Arizona State and Boise State were big underdogs and how the CFP may need to tweak its format to get rid of automatic byes for conference champions, coming off four first-round blowouts. Instead, Boise State battled Penn State close deep into the fourth quarter, and Arizona State pushed Texas to two overtimes.
The conventional wisdom was that the No. 5 seed might have an easier path in a given CFP bracket, or that Penn State had an easy path this year as the No. 6 seed. It sure didn’t look easy in the quarterfinals.
This CFP format was designed when the Pac-12 existed as a Power 5 conference. The purpose of the byes was to incentivize the regular season and conference championships. It very much did that, even with the Football Bowl Subdivision’s top tier reduced to a Power 4.
Was it fair that Arizona State, ranked No. 12 in the final CFP rankings, got a bye? Maybe not. But the NFL is about to have a 14-win team from the NFC North play on the road in the playoffs. Division and conference championships are supposed to matter so that the regular season still matters, especially in college football when we’re comparing teams with data and eye test and very little intersecting data points. The Sun Devils and the Big 12 pounded the table in saying they should be ranked higher. It looks like they had a good point. — Chris Vannini
Texas squanders chances to put the game away
The way Texas allowed Arizona State to hang around on Wednesday was an alarming development for Longhorns fans.
Texas felt like a team in full control of the game with 10:17 left, after Ewers’ touchdown run gave the Longhorns a 24-8 lead. But that lead withered away after multiple errors: missed field goals, a turnover, defensive penalties and breakdowns that set up the Sun Devils’ explosive plays.
The defense bears the brunt of the responsibility for allowing 16 fourth-quarter points, but that unit did its job for the other three quarters. If Texas’ offense had done what it is capable of, the game wouldn’t have even been in reach.
It looked early like Texas might run away with it, after an easy two-play touchdown drive in the first quarter and Silas Bolden’s punt return touchdown. But after its first offensive drive, Texas generated just three points over the next six possessions. The Longhorns entered the fourth quarter having run just 27 offensive plays, with just 16 rushing yards, 141 total yards and a 1-for-6 performance on third downs.
Texas finally broke out of its funk on the fourth-quarter touchdown drive, but the lack of a run game presence for three quarters was puzzling to say the least. And between the two touchdown drives, Texas hit only one explosive play in that nearly-three quarter stretch: a 24-yard pass from Ewers to Tre Wisner.
The Longhorns have so much offensive talent, from the line of scrimmage to the skill positions, that it can be frustrating to watch them spin their wheels. They certainly weren’t helped by the fact that Arizona State played keep-away (the Sun Devils had run 68 plays through three quarters, more than three times as many as Texas). — Sam Khan Jr.
This story will be updated.
(Photo: Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
