No. 1 Alabama wins SEC with rout of Florida

They’ll face off Saturday in the Southeastern Conference championships game, with the top-ranked Crimson Tide (12-0, 8-0 SEC) heavily favored to lock up its third straight trip to the College Football Playoff with a victory over the No. 15 Gators (8-3, 6-2).

Evan, 6, and James, 4, waved their pom poms for nearly four quarters and during the trophy celebration as Alabama won its second consecutive SEC championship by beating Florida 54-16 before a capacity crowd.

Now all Alabama has to do is sit back and wait. Prior to Saturday, Alabama’s season-high point total was a 52-6 win to open the season against Southern Cal. Alabama will enter the 2017 College Football Playoff as the only undefeated team left in the Power 5. Now it’s just a matter of whom the Tide will play. As a result, they ended up beating a number one ranked Alabama team! The Crimson Tide would have three more touchdowns in the second half, while Appleby failed to get anything going for Florida.

He suffered a fractured leg in October, and in stepped sophomore Minkah Fitzpatrick, who now has a school-record four career interceptions returned for touchdowns before the end of his second season on campus. Appleby threw for 261 yards, but with sacks and a failed fake punt, Florida finished the game with zero rushing yards against the nation’s top run defense. Of course, Alabama dominated the second half, rushing for 174 yards. Sean Dion Hamilton picked off an Appleby pass and moved it to the Florida 12 to set up an Adam Griffith 31 yard field goal.

All told, it wasn’t that different from what might have been expected from a game between these two teams, given that Alabama won the turnover battle and made no major mistakes.

Alabama leads college football with 14 non-offensive touchdowns this season, with 10 coming from the defense. Jalen Hurts led them down the field for a touchdown to extend their lead to 23-9. “I felt like we were a little flat in the locker room at halftime, and we came out and went three-and-out on offense”. Backup running back Derrick Gore scored on a 10-yard touchdown run to tack on the final score of the game.

It was 33-16 at intermission, Alabama scoring the most first-half points in an SEC title game. He also rushed for 85 yards on 17 attempts for the Tigers, who won back-to-back ACC titles for the first time since winning three straight from 1986-88.

The Crimson Tide then scored 17 unanswered points before Florida’s Appleby threw a second touchdown pass with 19 seconds remaining in the half.

That’s an average of 0.2 yards per carry.

Bama did score an SEC Championship Game 33 first half points and had a 33-16 lead, but it was not an impressive showing.

That eighth title also makes them the leader in SEC titles, passing Florida’s 7. After that, the uncertainty of an offseason where they clearly need to upgrade their offense in a big way through recruiting.

But the offense still failed to deliver.

The senior missed a 40-yard field goal and one of his extra points was lower than Lil Jon before splitting the uprights. The Crimson Tide have been notoriously slow starters in 2016 and in this contest the team was true to form with a sluggish start, especially on offense. However, the Gators recovered the fumble only to turn their drive into a three-and-out drive and Townsend’s third punt of the day. Those were the first TDs Alabama had allowed since October 22.

Walker went 16 for 25 for 199 yards, and middle linebacker Jarred Alwan led the Owls defense with 13 tackles.

Alabama’s fourth quarter touchdowns looked like a team just running the clock and finally reaching the end zone.

Clemson finished No. 3 in the AP Top 25, a spot behind Ohio State (11-1). Then came a blocked UF punt that Josh Jacobs took for a touchdown and a blocked PAT that Florida ran in for a safety.