Explore More
The beauty and tradition of the Rose Bowl was relocated to the sprawling concrete of North Texas. The backdrop of the sun-soaked, San Gabriel Mountains was replaced by a mountain of metal and glass inside ultra-modern AT&T Stadium. The game’s classic logo sat beneath Jerry Jones’ oversized jumbotron.
Nothing could have looked more out of place — except Notre Dame in the College Football Playoff.
On the field where the Fighting Irish failed to score a touchdown in a blowout playoff loss to Clemson two years back, No. 4 Notre Dame suffered its latest humiliation on the sport’s biggest stage, as No. 1 Alabama cruised to a 31-14 win Friday to advance to the national championship game for the fifth time in the past six years.
The Crimson Tide (12-0) will play the winner of No. 2 Clemson/No. 3 Ohio State on Jan. 11 in Miami, where Nick Saban can pass fellow Alabama legend Paul “Bear” Bryant with a record-setting seventh national championship.
“I was really proud of the way we came out and played,” Saban said. “We didn’t finish the game like we’d like. Took the air out of it on offense. I’ve always got something to complain about.”
Eight years after Brian Kelly was embarrassed in the national title game against Alabama, Notre Dame (10-2) still looked like a featherweight in the wrong class, incapable of standing toe-to-toe with the strongest teams in the nation. In seven BCS or New Year’s Six bowl games, Notre Dame has gone winless, with no game decided by fewer than two touchdowns.
“The margin is not the issue. Losing is losing,” Kelly said. “This wasn’t a matter of not having enough players to compete against Alabama. … Everybody needs to continue this narrative that Notre Dame’s not good enough. Look at the scores of the games that Alabama has played all year.”
The 17-point margin won’t accurately document the domination.
DeVonta Smith could do as he pleased, compiling 130 receiving yards and three touchdowns from fellow Heisman finalist Mac Jones, who completed 25 of 30 passes for 297 yards and four touchdowns.
Smith’s first score came less than five minutes after kickoff, as he took a short pass in the flat and beat multiple defenders for a 26-yard touchdown. On its next possession, Alabama needed just five plays to finish a 97-yard drive.
Just before Jahleel Billingsley’s 12-yard touchdown catch, All-American running back Najee Harris made a metaphor of the mismatch, hurdling over the head of cornerback Nick McCloud, en route to a 53-yard run.
“I actually try to teach him not do it, and it didn’t work,” Saban said of Harris, who ran for 125 yards. “For a big guy, it’s pretty amazing he can do that.”
For 8 minutes and 3 seconds, Notre Dame’s game plan looked sound. At the conclusion of a 15-play, 75-yard drive, Kyren Williams punched in a fourth-down score from 1-yard out to cut the deficit to 14-7 early in the second quarter.
But Smith responded less than three minutes later, taking a short slant 34 yards for a touchdown.
“They make me look a lot better than I am,” Jones said. “I’m not very athletic. I just try to get the ball to the right people. We have the best offense in the country in our mind.”
Although Alabama’s offense was held to a two-year low of 31 points, the winningest quarterback in Notre Dame history couldn’t capitalize.
Against a secondary which had been torched for 408 passing yards and 46 points in its most recent game, Ian Book never posed a threat in his second dismal playoff performance, repeatedly playing it safe with dump-offs until garbage time. When Book — who produced a largely meaningless 284 total yards — finally took a chance downfield, he was intercepted by Christian Harris on a badly underthrown ball midway through the third quarter.
On the next possession, Smith sealed the game with a 7-yard touchdown, putting the Crimson Tide up 28-7 with 4:58 left in the third quarter.
“We played really good team defense,” Saban said. “We controlled the quarterback about as well as you could do.”
After being shut out for more than 41 minutes, the 20-point underdog cashed in on Book’s 1-yard touchdown run with 56 seconds left in the fourth quarter.
Who says Notre Dame can’t win when it counts?
ncG1vNJzZmimqaW8tMCNnKamZ2Jlf3J7j2pmaWlfmLytuMSgnGaen6TBo63LpWSppJGuvKeyjJ2cr6eeqa5uv8yiq6FlkaGuo63MmmSbnZGpeq%2B706ucZpyRorJw