ARLINGTON, Texas — And now, 15 thoughts from Notre Dame 27, Penn State 24 and Ohio State 28, Texas 14 — two much-needed, much-enjoyed fourth-quarter finishes in the College Football Playoff semifinals.
1. The camera operators for the mammoth video board at AT&T Stadium love their crowd shots. There were several between every play. Friday night’s Ohio State-Texas Cotton Bowl provided them with an endless supply of dudes in Buckeyes jerseys flashing the Block O and women in cowboy boots giving the Hook ’Em sign.
When Ohio State’s Jack Sawyer stripped Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers, picked up the ball and returned it for a game-sealing 83-yard touchdown, that board morphed into a long montage of euphoric Buckeyes fans mixed with Longhorn surrender cobras. Moments earlier, No. 5 seed Texas was at the 1-yard line, possibly about to send this Playoff semifinal to overtime. Now, with one remarkable play, No. 8 seed Ohio State was on its way to Atlanta.
A pair of dramatic semifinals on back-to-back nights give us a Jan. 20 clash between the Buckeyes and No. 7 seed Notre Dame in the first all-Midwest national championship game since … well, ever.
JACK SAWYER SCOOP-AND-SCORE 😱
Ohio State is one step closer to advancing to the national championship! pic.twitter.com/BPoV5FBRGZ
— ESPN (@espn) January 11, 2025
2. I knew the first 12-team Playoff would be compelling. I underestimated the extent.
In the old days, the four-team field was announced in early December, then the teams went into hibernation for a month. They finally came back for New Year’s to play a pair of semifinals that were sometimes great but sometimes anticlimactic.
This year, by the time the teams got to the semis, we’d been invested in their stories for weeks. Like following an Olympic swimmer on his quest for gold, we became Jeremiyah Love fans with his 98-yard touchdown against Indiana and marveled when he trucked four Penn State defenders on a 2-yard touchdown. We turned on that Dec. 21 Tennessee-Ohio State game not knowing whether the Buckeyes still had a pulse post-Michigan. Three wins later, they’re on the brink of a national championship.
Ohio State and Notre Dame will be playing for the third consecutive season, and yet this feels like an entirely fresh matchup. So much has happened since then. Perhaps Lou Holtz will perform the coin toss.
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3. Generational freshman Jeremiah Smith had a combined 13 catches for 290 yards and four touchdowns through the Buckeyes’ first two Playoff games. The story of the Cotton Bowl figured to be whether Texas’s talented defense could slow him down. The Horns did, holding Smith to one first-quarter catch for 3 yards.
From start to finish, Texas made Ohio State earn this one. The Longhorns gave up one home run play, TreVeyon Henderson’s 75-yard catch and run touchdown to go up 14-7 in the second quarter. But the Buckeyes, which did themselves no favors with penalties, punted on four straight first-half possessions and did not score in the third quarter, which began with quarterback Will Howard throwing a pick.
But come the fourth quarter, Howard and the Buckeyes showed they’re not all 50-yard TDs. They took over on their 12-yard line with 14:47 left and spent the next 7:45 grinding out an 88-yard drive. Facing a fourth-and-2 at the Texas 34, Howard kept on a delayed draw and ran 18 yards toward the end zone (before slipping). The drive culminated in a Quinshon Judkins 1-yard TD. Obviously, the game was far from over, but it was an important moment. They’ll need more drives like it against an even stingier Notre Dame defense.
4. Fittingly, though, the Buckeyes sealed their victory with a huge defensive play by one of their veteran stalwarts in Sawyer. For all the star power on the other side of the ball, Ohio State’s defense has been its constant, behind the likes of Sawyer, bookend JT Tuimoloau (1.5 sacks) and linebacker Cody Simon (nine tackles, three TFLs). It wasn’t flawless. Ewers, under heavy pressure most of the night, still threw for 287 yards and two TDs, one being a game-tying 26-yard throw to Jaydon Blue. And after falling behind 21-14, Texas drove from its own 25 to the Buckeyes’ 1 with three minutes left.
But then Lathan Ransom snuffed out a second-down toss to Quintrevion Wisner for a 7-yard loss, Sawyer forced an incompletion on third-and-goal and then … you saw it.
GO DEEPER
Nobody is more Ohio State than Jack Sawyer. The Cotton Bowl’s defining play had to be his
5. Day is one win away from completing a world-record turnaround from the most hated man in Ohio to its conquering hero. His former rival, Jim Harbaugh, went from having to take a pay cut to winning the first of three straight Big Ten titles in 2021. The guy Day is about to face again, Freeman, was able to erase the stench of that loss to Northern Illinois throughout this season. But Day has pulled this off in the span of four games. Ohio State fans may never forgive him for the Michigan losses, even with a trophy, and they’ll certainly be disappointed if the Buckeyes fall short next Monday.
But no one could possibly say the guy doesn’t know what he’s doing/has been riding Urban Meyer’s coattails/can’t win the big one, etc. The SEC has been the country’s measuring stick for 18 years, and Day’s team defeated two of that league’s top-three teams since Dec. 21. In between, it walloped the No. 1 team in the country. Give the man his flowers.
6. America’s most popular backup quarterback, Arch Manning, got in for one play, a fourth-and-1 at midfield in the second quarter, and promptly ran for 8 yards on a keeper. Much to the chagrin of some Horns fans, he came right back out.
Ewers, who presumably played his last game in a Texas uniform (whether he turns pro or enters the portal), should be nothing but commended for what he did in three seasons at Texas. He led a program that had been down for nearly 15 years to a Big 12 title, an SEC title game and back-to-back Playoffs. He saved the day against Arizona State in the quarterfinals, and, for the second year in a row, had the Horns on the cusp of a semifinal victory (last year Texas lost close to Washington) but couldn’t quite get there. He went 21-5 as the starter over the past two seasons.
He wasn’t Vince Young or Colt McCoy. But he was the face of the program’s best two-year run since those guys played.
A 41-yard field goal by Mitch Jeter sealed Notre Dame’s 27-24 win against Penn State in the CFP semifinals.(Sam Navarro / Imagn Images)
7. In 2012, when Notre Dame last reached a national championship game, the 12-0 Irish wrapped up their berth on Nov. 24. It would be 44 days before they played again in their infamous 42-14 flop against Alabama. The stigma from that game fed the notion that Notre Dame had a free pass to the BCS/CFP by not playing a 13th game. It lingered for so long that Penn State’s James Franklin inexplicably pulled the “everyone should be in a conference” card just days before facing the independent Irish in a semifinal game.
Thanks to the 12-team format, Notre Dame got to definitively prove it belongs in the natty. Even if it loses 55-0 to Ohio State (it won’t), Notre Dame had to play 15 games to get there, culminating with three top-10 teams in a row, including SEC champion Georgia and 13-game winner Penn State.
If, after all that, you’re still hung up on “but they lost to NIU four months ago,” congrats on becoming the real-life Debbie Downer character from “Saturday Night Live.”
8. My colleague Ralph Russo wrote this week about how Marcus Freeman did the unthinkable and made the Irish likable. Watching their last-second 27-24 semifinal win, I saw his point. This Notre Dame team is not some little engine that could (the Fighting Irish closed as one-point underdogs against the Nittany Lions) but they have a lot of feel-good components. The boyish-looking head coach who initially seemed in over his head. An unfathomable Week 2 loss to NIU that could have crushed them. Injuries. Thirty-plus years of “can’t win the big one.” And more injuries — like quarterback Riley Leonard briefly getting knocked out Thursday night.
But they’ve also got a bunch of badasses. Like Love barreling through four defenders to reach the end zone. Or receiver Jaden Greathouse making two different DBs fall on his 54-yard TD catch. Or linebacker Jack Kiser grabbing an acrobatic interception that would have saved a touchdown if not for a phantom pass-interference call.
And yet, even with all that going for them, the game was very much in doubt until …
9. Drew Allar has carried the weight of savior status since arriving at Penn State. The junior led his team to 13 wins this season. But when he met his biggest moment yet, with 33 seconds left in a tie game, he did the unforgivable and threw over the middle under duress. Notre Dame’s Christian Gray intercepted it, giving Leonard the chance to set up Mitch Jeter’s game-winning 41-yard field goal. (Props to Leonard on that third-and-3 dart to Greathouse.) Allar owned it in his postgame news conference, during which Franklin could be seen trying to cheer him up.
Franklin’s infamous top-five record dropped to 1-15 at Penn State, but there was no in-game decision to blame the coach for on this night. He has, however, let his star QB down.
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Brian Kelly is Thursday’s big loser and will have to watch Notre Dame play for a title
10. It’s inconceivable how a team could win 13 games and reach the CFP semifinals with such a desolate receiver room. Not one of Allar’s 12 completions Thursday went to a wide receiver. Star tight end Tyler Warren and running backs Nicholas Singleton and Kaytron Allen did their usual things, but receivers Harrison Wallace III and Omari Evans were MIA. Franklin tried to plug the hole when he landed Ohio State’s Julian Fleming, a former top-five recruit, but he barely contributed.
Whatever money Penn State’s NIL collective had to spend to keep Allar in State College for another year, it better have enough left over to go on a wide receiver shopping spree.
In the meantime, here’s one parting salute to Warren, who finished the 2024 season with 104 catches (tied for second nationally) for 1,233 yards (sixth) and eight TDs. Those are impressive numbers for any pass-catcher, much less a tight end. For perspective, Georgia’s Brock Bowers, himself an all-timer, topped out at 63 catches.
11. While Franklin still has not shed his big-game rep, Penn State hasn’t come this close to a national championship since 2005, when it finished No. 3. If you’re a Nittany Lions fan who’s been living in “almost” mode for the past decade, you should feel more optimistic today than at any point since at least the Saquon Barkley era. But Franklin will remain polarizing. According to my colleague Pete Sampson, Freeman was ticked at Franklin after their pregame news conference, when the Penn State coach joked about the 39-year-old’s youth. “All the anger went toward us and that anger went onto the field,” said Notre Dame safety Xavier Watts.
Penn State: Now less likable than Notre Dame.
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Notre Dame used everything to beat Penn State. Did James Franklin provide extra juice?
12. Notre Dame quarterback Steve Angeli played just one series after Leonard went out shortly before halftime, but it was a big one. The Irish trailed 10-0 and had shown little life on offense. Angeli took over at his own 40 and completed his first four passes, and 6-of-7 on the drive. He took two sacks, the second by Abdul Carter, ending any chance of a touchdown. But the Irish got three points, and more importantly, went into the half on a positive note. When Leonard returned for the second half, Notre Dame — which holds a ridiculous 155-10 edge in the “middle eight” this season — promptly drove for a game-tying touchdown.
Who knows if it ever gets to that point if Angeli hadn’t lived up to the moment?
13. I’ve now lived through a quarter-century of “Will THIS be the thing that forces Notre Dame to join a conference?” The most recent edition was the 12-team wrinkle where the Irish can never earn a first-round bye. Well, it took one season to prove this is in fact an ideal system for them.
In the four-team CFP, it was assumed Notre Dame would have to go undefeated to make it, as it did in 2018 and 2020, and sure enough, this year’s 11-1 team finished No. 5. No, they don’t get a bye, but they had the same amount of time off as first-round opponent Indiana. And perhaps most importantly, Notre Dame earned the maximum $20 million in payouts from the CFP for reaching the title game. Unlike schools in most conferences, they don’t have to share any of it.
The school arguably has less incentive today to join a conference than it did when it first struck its NBC deal 34 years ago.
14. Here’s another thing I was wrong about: Both the Orange and Cotton Bowls were packed. It did not matter that the Miami Gardens game was played on a Thursday in the first full work week of the year. Notre Dame and Penn State fans figured it out and filled Hard Rock Stadium. Even a snowstorm in the Dallas area that caused more than 1,000 canceled flights the day before the Cotton Bowl did not stop Ohio State fans from occupying roughly 45 percent of AT&T Stadium, and Texas fans the rest. (The official attendance of 74,527 was about 5,000 short of a sellout but empties were hardly noticeable.)
I should know better by this point: College football fans always find a way.
15. Finally, CFP and ESPN officials must be giddy beyond belief at the Ohio State-Notre Dame matchup. The former is the biggest TV draw in the sport, and the other the most prestigious brand. As I said off the top, people will have been following their respective stories for a month by the time we get to Jan. 20.
The CFP TV record for a national championship was 33.4 million for Ohio State-Oregon in 2014. That’s … a lot. By comparison, last year’s Michigan-Washington game drew 25 million. My guess is this one falls somewhere between the two.
But I’ve underestimated a lot of things throughout this CFP — including both Ohio State and Notre Dame.
(Top photo: Ron Jenkins / Getty Images)
