Alabama players celebrated their SEC Championship triumph over Georgia.
ATLANTA — As the final seconds ticked off an instant classic — a literal Southeastern Conference power struggle — Alabama celebrated, and rather wildly. Fireworks exploded as players sprinted onto the field, their triumph over Georgia not assured until the clock struck triple zeros. Hands were shaken, fists bumped, flags and towels waved.
The 32-28 victory earned Alabama a spot in the Bowl Championship Series title game in January, opposite Notre Dame, a matchup likely to shatter television records and draw more interest to a sport increasingly national in scope. First, though, the Crimson Tide needed to dispatch Georgia in the conference championship game, which it did — barely — as the Bulldogs ended the game 5 yards from the end zone in the Georgia Dome.
At that moment, and not a second earlier, Alabama secured one championship and moved closer to another, closer to its second consecutive national title and third in the past four seasons. The Fighting Irish will have something to say about that. So did Georgia, too, on Saturday.
For all of college football’s fancy passing, for all its spread offenses and Saturday shootouts, the two highest-ranked teams at season’s end — the Fighting Irish and the Crimson Tide — proved they could do something as simple as hand the ball off, push defenders backward, play great defense, throw occasionally and still win games.
Behind by 21-10 in the third quarter, Alabama (12-1) sent its oversize running backs, Eddie Lacy and T. J. Yeldon, up the middle and dared the Bulldogs to stop them. Georgia (11-2) did not, could not, slow the onslaught. Alabama ran for one score, then another, to reclaim the lead in a game best summarized like a children’s book title: See Alabama Run.
The Crimson Tide opened holes collectively large enough to drive a spaceship through. By the end of the third quarter, Alabama had averaged 7.8 yards per rush. Lacy had accumulated 181 rushing yards; Yeldon 105 in a secondary role. Georgia responded with its own score, on a Todd Gurley touchdown plunge, naturally, but Alabama simply returned to its ground-and-pound approach.
Alabama ran to move the ball downfield, where it punted but pinned Georgia near its end zone. When the Crimson Tide took the ball back, with 5 minutes 25 seconds left, they ran again, even on third-and-5.
All that running set up the only Crimson Tide pass that really mattered, a rainbow that left quarterback A. J. McCarron’s hand and flew 45 yards downfield to Amari Cooper, who secured the spiral in the end zone.
Alabama had somehow managed in the first two quarters to stumble and bumble its way ahead. McCarron, the second-most-efficient passer in the nation, looked nothing like the most valuable offensive player in last year’s national championship game.
McCarron looked, well, quite inefficient. He fumbled in the first quarter when the star linebacker Jarvis Jones shed two blockers and sacked him from behind. He telegraphed a second-quarter pass down near the end zone, which safety Sanders Commings saw coming and intercepted.
Alabama, meanwhile, converted a fake punt only to be whistled for delay of game. Coach Nick Saban sprinted onto the field, his face red, eyes narrowed, so incensed he lacked only steam coming out his ears.
Georgia converted its own fake punt at the start of the second quarter, a direct snap to Arthur Lynch, a tight end who took two steps forward and all but threw the football like a javelin to Commings, a safety of myriad talents, for a first down.
Soon afterward, quarterback Aaron Murray, the most efficient passer in the nation, found tight end Jay Rome for a 19-yard score on a drag route. Georgia led, 7-0, after that 13-play drive.
For all the speed evident on the field, this game again highlighted what most distinguishes the SEC from other conferences. Speed, yes, but speed in big, tall, athletic players. Big people beat up little people, as the football-minded like to say down south. It just hurts more when they are fast.
