THE Ohio State University was defending a national championship and spent most of this year looking invulnerable at #1, a place they held from week two through week fifteen.
Many people felt that Miami shouldn’t have been in the tournament at all. They didn’t even qualify to play in the championship game in their own conference, and came into this game as 9.5 point underdogs.
None of that matters now.
Miami has made the final four by knocking off an SEC team and a Big Ten team. They have made it to that point with little offense. They scored only ten against A&M in round one, with 278 yards from scrimmage. Their offense scored only 17 against Ohio State in round two, and they again failed to reach 300 yards from scrimmage.
But, oh, that defense!
They gave a Heisman finalist QB the worst day of his sporting career. They sacked him five times and picked him off twice, including a pick-six. The Hurricanes caused the worst performance by an elite quarterback since 1998, when the Farrelly Brothers cast Brett Favre in There’s Something About Mary.
Weird trivia:
So far, none of the top four seeds have won a game in the new format! Last year the top four seeds, coming off their first-round byes, all lost in the New Year’s Eve/Day round. Then the two best remaining teams, seeds 5 and 6, lost in the next round. Then the next best remaining team, seed 7, lost in the championship, leaving the eighth seed as the national champion.
Yep, The U! #3 reminded me of Warren Sapp. Getting ready for ‘Bama to take out Indiana now.
Oregon currently blanking Texas Tech, so teams with byes are now 0-6 over the past two years.