Winners and Losers from Week 14 of College Football
What started out as a boring final day of the 2016 college football regular season quickly devolved into flashback-button-smashing chaos in the late games as the Mountain West, Big Ten and ACC championship games all came down to the wire.
In the end, though, things went about as smoothly as they possibly could for the College Football Playoff selection committee.
Western Michigan won and Navy lost, removing all doubt from the Group of Five New Year's Six scenario. And Clemson, Washington and Penn State won their title games, much to the chagrin of Michigan.
But there were plenty of other winners and losers in Week 14, including a handful of teams that didn't even suit up this weekend. Read on for the full list.
Winner: Butch Hampton, Western Michigan
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With Western Michigan averaging just a shade under six touchdowns per game, there weren't many field-goal attempts to be had for Butch Hampton. The Broncos place-kicker entered the MAC Championship Game 68-of-69 on extra-point attempts, but he was just 13-of-18 on his three-point tries, including misses from 24 and 28 yards.
Hampton hadn't converted on more than two field goals in a game since the season opener against Northwestern, and he hadn't even attempted three field goals in a game since Week 3 against Illinois.
But in the most important game in the history of the program—Western Michigan had never won 10 games in a season before, let alone 13—the true freshman was cool as the other side of the pillow, going 5-of-5 from 21, 27, 33, 34 and 42 yards in the 29-23 win over Ohio.
For most of the season, Zach Terrell and Jarvion Franklin were the heroes. The former had 30 touchdowns against just one interception coming into the game. The latter averaged more than 100 rushing yards and one touchdown per game and was also the team's fourth-leading receiver.
For the first time in forever, though, the offense struggled to punch the ball into the end zone. Terrell threw a pair of second-half interceptions, and Franklin had a grand total of 47 yards from scrimmage. They repeatedly moved the ball well enough to get into field-goal range, but also repeatedly stalled out before calling upon Hampton.
Thanks to his career high in field goals, Western Michigan remains perfect and should be rowing the boat to the Cotton Bowl.
Loser: Pac-12 Quarterbacks
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Over his previous three games against Arizona, Washington State and Utah, Colorado's Sefo Liufau was averaging 276.0 passing yards, 74.3 rushing yards and three total touchdowns per game. And within the first few plays against Washington in the Pac-12 title game, it looked like he was headed for another solid night, completing a nine-yard pass on the opening play and scrambling for 25 yards two plays later.
Unfortunately for Liufau and the Buffaloes, he injured his ankle on a sack on that first drive and wasn't seen again until the second half. And when he did come back, he looked awful. He threw a pick-six on the first play of the second half, threw another interception on his second pass attempt and would throw a third pick on the final play of the third quarter.
"Liufau is an example of why sometimes it's better—especially if you're a mobile quarterback—that you shouldn't play in a game that you can't be 100 percent," said Robert Smith during the Fox postgame show.
Colorado's star on offense during the regular season finished the game with 34 total yards and three turnovers. Liufau's replacement during the first half was better than that, but not emphatically so. Steven Montez was 5-of-12 for 60 yards and led the Buffaloes on their only touchdown drive of the game.
Washington's Jake Browning didn't look anything like his usual self, either. Some thought Browning could jump ahead of Louisville's Lamar Jackson to the top of the Heisman race with a big performance against Colorado, but he posted season-worst numbers in completions, completion percentage and yards, going just 9-of-24 for 118 yards and two touchdowns—and one of those two scores came on a pass that it appeared he was trying to throw away.
Fortunately for Browning, his offensive line and running backs were outstanding in a 41-10 rout of the Buffaloes. Both Myles Gaskin (159 yards) and Lavon Coleman (101 yards and a TD) went over the century mark on the ground, gashing Colorado's rush defense for a season-worst 265 yards.
Winner: USC Trojans
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For College Football Playoff seeding purposes, a ton of Big Ten teams were rooting against Washington on Friday night. But one program desperately pulling for the Huskies was USC.
As far as head-to-head wins are concerned, USC's resume was always going to get a little prettier at the conclusion of the Pac-12 Championship Game, since the Trojans beat both Colorado and Washington during the regular season. Serving as the only team to beat 12-1 Washington, though, is a nice feather to have in their cap.
However, the real reason the Trojans wanted to see Washington win in a blowout was so they could be assured a spot in a New Year's Six bowl game.
Had Colorado won Friday night, the Buffaloes were not going to jump into the Top Four of the CFP rankings, and thus would have been the Pac 12's representative in the Rose Bowl. Worse yet for USC, unless the Huskies were downright embarrassed in the game, it was highly unlikely they would drop below the Trojans in the standings, so Washington would have been invited to the Cotton Bowl before USC.
Despite the belief by many that USC is one of four best teams in the country right now, it probably would have been left out of the New Year's Six mix had Colorado won.
Instead, Washington's 31-point win all but cements it as a Top Four team while also almost certainly booting No. 8 Colorado behind No. 11 USC in the final CFP rankings.
We'll see what the selection committee has up its sleeve Sunday afternoon, but that should mean USC goes to the Rose Bowl to face Michigan—which, frankly, would be a more entertaining game than either of the national semifinals pairings.
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
Loser: TCU Horned Frogs
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As far as bowl invites are concerned, it was a meaningless week for TCU. With a win, perhaps the Horned Frogs could have jumped into position for the Texas Bowl instead of the Liberty Bowl or Cactus Bowl, but they already picked up their sixth win of the year last week.
They certainly looked like a team saving itself for the postseason.
They started Foster Sawyer at quarterback with Kenny Hill recovering from an ankle injury, but Hill was in there midway through the third quarter after the sophomore opened the game just 12-of-24 for 86 yards.
Though they didn't commit a turnover until the final snap of the game, TCU didn't score a touchdown in the 30-6 loss to Kansas State. In fact, until the final drive, TCU didn't even cross its own 41-yard line in the second half. And on that final drive, Hill had to be helped off the field after appearing to reaggravate his ankle injury.
Meanwhile, Wildcats QB Jesse Ertz had 329 total yards and two touchdowns. Justin Silmon ran for another 133 yards and two scores against a defense that held the Longhorns to nine points just eight days prior.
Coupled with Baylor's loss to West Virginia, TCU's fall to 6-6 means that seven of the preseason AP Top 25 teams (No. 10 Notre Dame, No. 11 Ole Miss, No. 12 Michigan State, No. 13 TCU, No. 16 UCLA, No. 23 Baylor and No. 24 Oregon) finished the regular season at .500 or worse.
Winner: Anthony Wales, Western Kentucky
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Points were expected to be plentiful in the Conference USA Championship Game between Louisiana Tech and Western Kentucky. According to OddsShark, the over/under was somewhere between 78-80.5, with the Hilltoppers favored by 11-13, putting the expected score somewhere in the vicinity of 46-34. Thus, lack of defense and a final score of 58-44 in Western Kentucky's favor wasn't much of a surprise.
But no one could have predicted that senior running back Anthony Wales would set all sorts of career records in this one.
Wales scored three touchdowns in the first quarter alone, pacing the Hilltoppers to a 24-17 lead at the first intermission. He would find the end zone two more times in the second half for a career-high five total touchdowns. Wales also set a new personal best in rushing yards (209)—surpassing the 193 he posted last season against North Texas.
Wales wasn't the only Hilltopper who put up huge numbers, though. Star wideout Taywan Taylor had 194 receiving yards and two touchdowns—his ninth consecutive game with at least one score. Nicholas Norris also had 150 receiving yards as Western Kentucky finished off the win with 656 total yards.
We won't know for sure until tomorrow who, when or where Western Kentucky will be playing next, but there's a good chance it'll be against Memphis in the Boca Raton Bowl. If you hate defense and love points, that might be the most enjoyable game of them all.
Loser: Group of Five Drama
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There were concerns throughout the week about what the selection committee would do if both No. 17 Western Michigan and No. 19 Navy won their conference championship games.
The highest-ranked Group of Five champion automatically gets an invite to the Cotton Bowl. But Navy still has a game remaining against Army next week. With the Midshipmen and Broncos so closely ranked heading into this week, the committee likely would have needed to wait seven more days to make a final decision on the rankings, thus holding all of the other bowl invites hostage until the Army-Navy game ended.
Temple had other plans.
Navy's triple-option QB Will Worth entered the game averaging 123.9 passing yards, 107.4 rushing yards and 3.0 touchdowns per game. But he suffered a season-ending ankle injury early in the second quarter, leaving the rest of the game in the hands of Zach Abey.
By that time, though, the game was pretty much already over. Temple scored touchdowns on each of its first three possessions and entered the game having held its last four opponents to a mere 5.8 points per game. With or without Worth, things were not looking up for the Midshipmen. They ended up losing 34-10, giving Temple the ACC championship.
At 13-0, Western Michigan likely would have received the Cotton Bowl invite regardless of what Navy did. But this result removes all doubt. Start rowing that boat to Arlington, Texas.
Winner: Oklahoma Sooners
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The inherent problem with the College Football Playoff is that as soon as it became apparent the Big 12 had no shot at landing a team in the Top Four, people stopped paying attention to its championship race. But while the world obsessed over Washington, Michigan, Wisconsin and Penn State, Oklahoma went undefeated in conference play and ended up putting together one heck of a season.
Sooners wide receiver Dede Westbrook was arguably the best senior in the country. After a poor showing in nonconference play, he had at least one receiving touchdown in all nine Big 12 games while averaging 145.7 yards. Bedlam was no different, as he got the scoring started for Oklahoma with a 69-yard touchdown reception on the first play of the second quarter. He had 111 receiving yards in the first half before missing the second half with a head injury.
Junior running back Samaje Perine was even more impressive with a season-high 239 rushing yards and one touchdown. Perine was one of four Sooners to gain at least 66 yards on one play in this game, ripping off a huge run on the first play of the second half to help put Oklahoma ahead to stay. Fellow running back Joe Mixon had a 79-yard touchdown run one play after Ben Grogan missed a 38-yard field goal—a 10-point swing that led to the 38-20 final score.
And, per usual, Baker Mayfield was rock solid.
In 10 of 12 games this season, Mayfield completed at least 66.7 percent of his passes, including going 13-of-19 for 288 yards and three scores against Oklahoma State. With more than 3,800 all-purpose yards and 44 touchdowns against eight interceptions, he should be one of the five finalists for the Heisman in advance of a trip to the Sugar Bowl.
Loser: Northern Illinois Huskies
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We started the week with 76 six-win teams and two more teams (South Alabama and Louisiana-Lafayette) with a chance to get there. North Texas and Mississippi State are the top two 5-7 teams in terms of APR score, followed by Texas and Northern Illinois.
With reports surfacing earlier in the week that Texas would decline a bowl invitation if it received one, Northern Illinois was the one team with the most rooting interest in the two Sun Belt games.
The Huskies will have to settle for getting an early start on preparation for next season, though, as both the Jaguars and Ragin' Cajuns improved to 6-6 against inferior foes.
South Alabama got three rushing touchdowns from Xavier Johnson, including the game-sealing 35-yard scamper late in the fourth quarter. The Jaguars got more of a fight from 3-9 New Mexico State than expected, allowing 359 rushing yards, but they only trailed for 15 seconds in the 35-28 win.
But at least there was some offense in that game for Northern Illinois fans to nervously watch. Louisiana-Lafayette vs. Louisiana-Monroe was one of the ugliest college football games of the season.
ULM's Caleb Evans was 3-of-14 for 31 yards and two interceptions, and he was the more impressive of the two quarterbacks. ULL's Anthony Jennings was 2-of-5 for zero yards with a pair of picks. There were a total of seven turnovers in the game, including two fumbles the Ragin' Cajuns returned for touchdowns in the first half of their 30-3 win.
Maybe some team will shock us by declining a bowl invite, but it appears Northern Illinois will be on the outside looking in.
Winner: Alabama Crimson Tide
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Rather than marvel at what Alabama has done this season, we've taken the Crimson Tide for granted. We put them at No. 1 in the rankings week after week and argue over who has the best chance to eventually beat them, but we've also neglected them in nearly every week of the winners and losers because it's so unsurprising when they win yet another game in dominant fashion.
But here's a microcosm of how unbeatable this team has been: Alabama had negative-seven yards of total offense in the first quarter against Florida, yet still led 16-9 after 15 minutes thanks to a pick-six, a blocked punt and another interception that set the Crimson Tide up for an easy field goal.
You may have heard a few dozen times this week that Alabama did not allow an opponent to score a single touchdown in the month of November. That streak came to an end on the first drive of the SEC Championship Game, but they went on to win a 54-16 laugher, locking up the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff beyond a shadow of a doubt.
The Gators didn't have anything close to the best rushing attack in the country this season, but they finished this game with 30 carries for zero yards, which is just silly. Alabama has now held its 13 opponents to a combined total of three rushing touchdowns and an average of 63.4 yards per game.
Meanwhile, Alabama ran for 234 yards and four touchdowns against what had been one of the stingier rushing defenses for most of the season.
At this point, it's time to stop debating whether anyone can beat Alabama this year and start debating whether this is the most dominant team in more than a decade. For all the fuss about who deserves to be No. 4 in the final CFP rankings, we just feel bad for the team that draws that lot on Selection Sunday.
Loser: Ricky Williams and Charles White
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A few months ago, San Diego State running back Donnel Pumphrey was No. 75 on the all-time rushing list.
On his path to more than 2,000 rushing yards this season, though, Pumphrey has gone flying past such names as Bo Jackson, Earl Campbell, Eric Dickerson, Marshall Faulk, Marcus Allen, Thurman Thomas, Herschel Walker and LaDainian Tomlinson all the way into the top five.
With 110 more yards in the Mountain West Championship Game, he's at 6,290 career yards, bypassing two more legends—USC's Charles White and Texas' Ricky Williams. Pumphrey is now third on the all-time rushing list, trailing only Wisconsin's Ron Dayne and Pittsburgh's Tony Dorsett.
He would need more than 800 yards against Houston in the Las Vegas Bowl to catch Dayne for first place, which probably isn't going to happen. There's a chance he goes for 236 yards to match Dorsett for second place, though. He had four games this season with at least 220 yards, including a career-high 281 yards back in Week 2 against California.
What's odd is Pumphrey wasn't even San Diego State's best rusher in the game. Rashaad Penny had 117 yards and two touchdowns in the 27-24 win. Penny also had a 75-yard kickoff return to set up what ended up being the difference-making field goal.
Winner: Deshaun Watson, Clemson
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If you're a voter for the Heisman Trophy and you waited as long as possible to submit your ballot, Deshaun Watson gave you a lot more to think about.
With Louisville's Lamar Jackson watching from home, Clemson's dual-threat quarterback threw for 288 yards, ran for 85 more and had five total touchdowns in the ACC Championship Game, punching the Tigers' ticket to the College Football Playoff for a second consecutive year with a 42-35 win over the Hokies.
Watson did throw one interception in the game, but as seemed to be the case on a lot of his turnovers this season, it came on a bit of a fluky play. Vinny Mihota nearly broke his arm getting it in the way of an attempted pass that happened to deflect right into the arms of Andrew Motuapuaka.
Aside from that, Watson was nearly flawless.
The junior now has 3,914 passing yards and 37 touchdowns to go along with 529 rushing yards and six more scores. Those numbers don't quite stack up with what Jackson did this season, but Watson did his damage for a team that didn't finish out the year with losses to Houston and Kentucky and that won a conference championship.
Jackson will likely still win the Heisman, but the guy who recently sold the ticket he bought in the preseason on Jackson to win is looking like a genius right about now, as Watson's chances of winning are as good as they have been all year.
Loser: Wisconsin's Secondary
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The Big Ten Championship Game could not have started out any better for Wisconsin. The Badgers forced consecutive three-and-outs and led 14-0 in the first 12 minutes. Following a fumble recovery for a touchdown and two more stops, they were up 28-7 with the ball in Penn State territory late in the first half.
It all went downhill in a hurry from there.
Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley went 22 minutes of game time without throwing an incomplete pass. During that stretch, he was 9-of-9 for 241 yards and four touchdowns, including a 70-yard pass to Saeed Blacknall on the first play after Wisconsin's Andrew Endicott missed a field goal.
(Taking into consideration the blocked field goal returned for a touchdown in the monumental win over Ohio State, it would be hard to argue that any team made its opponents pay more dearly for missed field goals.)
Even after the completion streak ended, Wisconsin still found ways to gift yards to the Nittany Lions. An incomplete pass on 3rd-and-6 midway through the fourth quarter turned into a first down when Leon Jacobs was flagged for roughing the passer. Four plays later, another incomplete pass was wiped off the books by defensive pass interference.
As a result of Wisconsin's poor defense, Penn State scored 31 points on five consecutive drives and was able to escape with a 38-31 win.
With Clemson and Washington both winning, it seems a bit unlikely that either of these teams would have made it into the College Football Playoff, but the Nittany Lions should at least jump over Michigan to become the Big Ten's representative in the Rose Bowl. Had the Badgers not made McSorley look like the second coming of Kerry Collins, they could have been the team to receive that prestigious honor.
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
