Tigers heading to College Playoffs National Championship

But his running made up for it, as he rolled to 149 yards and a touchdown on 24 carries. He also passed for 187 yards and one touchdown, completing 16 of 31 attempts. He was intercepted once. Now, we begin to get ready for the trip to Glendale, Arizona for the National Championship.

Now comes an even greater challenge for Watson and Clemson, the nation’s only unbeaten team. Conventional wisdom on beating Alabama was to take away the run and make Coker, the promising Florida State transfer who sat the bench most of last season, win the game. He returned to the sideline in the second half in street clothes, with a bag of ice wrapped around his knee.

If college football fans squint their eyes just right when Clemson rubs on “Howard’s Rock” and then runs down the hill in Death Valley amid thunderous cheers, many would swear they were attending an SEC football game. His interception was a spectacular one-hand grab. The Tigers came out of halftime wanting to make sure that the game wasn’t going to mimic the ACC Championship Game, and it never did. In the days leading up to the game, his players told stories about their general, about the time previous year playing SC when Beasley had a strip sack, with the ball on the ground, a strength coach had to grab Venables to pull him back in order to keep him from jumping on the ball himself.

It showed on the first drive of the third quarter.

The Sooners went 67 yards in 10 plays, snapping a run of 13 unanswered points by the Tigers.

Oklahoma senior center Ty Darlington believed he and his teammates were about to play the game of their lives.

Near the end of the first half, with his team trailing 17-16, Watson led a drive down the field in the closing minutes, and had Clemson in ideal position to get the lead back. After returning on the second drive and notching a sack of quarterback Baker Mayfield, Lawson did not play after the first quarter. Clemson coach Dabo Swinney is an Alabama alumnus who played on the Tide’s 1992 national championship team.

“Going 15-0, it would mean we’re the best ever”, linebacker Travis Blanks said. Punter Andy Teasdall flipped a 31-yard pass to Christian Wilkins, a 315-pound freshman defensive tackle. The fake punt came when Clemson faced a fourth-and-4 from the Oklahoma 44.

Earlier in the day Thursday, Lawson made headlines for a different reason, when Dusty Dvoracek and Carey Murdock of WWLS-FM reported that Lawson went onto Oklahoma’s team bus after an event Wednesday and talked trash to the Sooners’ entire team.

This undefeated season was not a fluke, and neither was a 37-17 beatdown of a playoff-worthy Oklahoma. Zac Brooks came in and rumbled for 17 yards, bowling over the Sooners’ Ahmad Thomas in the process.

Clemson piled up 550 yards in the game, sealing the victory on Gallman’s 4-yard touchdown run with 10:48 remaining.

“We shocked them, didn’t we?” a beaming Swinney said. “As much as we hit him, when you hit them enough, they become inaccurate and get antsy and want to leave and escape the pocket”. It’s the will. (Watson) had that will in the second half, and we didn’t.

“It was just really during summer workouts, all the stuff they did”, Watson said. The job that Venables did in building last year’s Clemson defense, and then having to rebuild it entirely in 2015 after so many key players moved on to the National Football League, is nothing short of remarkable. The biggest loss was Cain, who was second on the team in receiving yards (582) and touchdown catches (five).