Are we straight on Miami in the College Football Playoff now?
Could it state the case any more clearly with Saturday on the line?
Sometimes you get an ending that says everything better than months of debate. The only debate after Miami’s 10-3 win is which play was bigger: Miami running back’s Mark Fletcher’s 56-yard run up with four minutes left to loosen a Texas A&M defense that hadn’t loosened all day, or Miami freshman Bryce Fitzgerald’s second interception, in the end zone with 24 seconds left to seal the win.
There was the biggest play of the big day. Take your pick. A or B. Fletcher or Fitzgerald. An offensive play in a game without offense, or a defensive gem in a game full of them.
If Miami needed to validate its vote into the CFP over Notre Dame, the program’s biggest win in more than two decades provided it. This game was medieval. Big hits. Loud tackles. The kind of physicality you rarely see in a college game underpinned by the kind of defense that’s out of fashion these days.
You winced just watching some of Saturday’s hits. That’s the kind of team Mario Cristobal has built, of course, and there he was on the field afterward, kissing his son, hugging bystanders, celebrating with the kind of emotion the day deserved and his personality hasn’t allowed to date.
It’s on to Ohio State now, which is perhaps fitting. Miami began its long fall from the big stage in college football with a controversial loss to Ohio State in the 2003 Fiesta Bowl. Get used to hearing about that game from yesteryear. It’ll be a storyline entering this next-generation game.
Saturday’s wasn’t a game to enjoy unless you love heavyweight, defensive football. It was the first game in the CFP’s 12 years to be scoreless at half. The story there was Miami missed two wind-swept field goals and Texas A&M had one blocked by Rueben Bain Jr.
“We were going to do what we talked about,’’ Cristobal said of what he told the team. “We’re going to out-hit them in every single phase.”
It was all of 3-3 after Texas A&M made a fourth-quarter field goal. Miami hadn’t moved the ball much. Offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson had reached into his bag of trick plays and had 69 yards of offense at half and three points with four minutes left to show for it.
First down at UM’s 14-yard line. Dawson was going to ride Fletcher now. All the low-productive chiseling Miami had done with its running game — chip, chip, chip — finally paid a dividend as this offensive line opened a hole in the middle.
Fletcher ran through it. And ran. It wasn’t just the longest run of Miami’s season. It was the longest of Fletcher’s career to the Texas A&M 30. He wasn’t done. He ran for 2, 12 and 3 yards to the 13-yard line. Just when you thought Cristobal would take a chip-shot field goal, freshman Malachi Toney took the ball around end for a touchdown.
That was some sense of relief for Toney. He had a 55-yard punt return earlier. He also had just fumbled in the fourth quarter to end a drive and had to be consoled on the bench.
So, in a program with a heavy of transfer portal, Toney was one of the rising freshman who showed the talent level Saturday. Fitzgerald was the other after Texas A&M drove to the Miami 5-yard line in the final minute.
Miami’s defense was strong all day. Bain had three sacks to quiet some Texas A&M talk last week. Miami had seven sacks and nine tackles for losses. But it was the three turnovers that stood out, none bigger than this one in the end zone to end the day.
Miami moves on now. It’s made the Final Eight. There were questions about how it got here and Notre Dame didn’t, and more talk it might need a win on the road to validate its playoff berth. Whether it did or didn’t is just conversation.
But it got the tough win in a tough manner. Fletcher’s big run. Fitzgerald’s second interception. The program that hasn’t been on the big stage for decades moves on to a bigger one now.