Posted on 12/29/2018 9:28:33 PM PST by blam
Alabama and Clemson will meet in the CFP National Championship for the third time in the last four years -- and the Crimson Tide are once again the favorites.
Alabama has been installed as a six-point favorite over Clemson for in the championship game on Jan. 7 (ESPN, 8 p.m. ET) in Santa Clara, California.
Alabama handled Oklahoma and will face Clemson again for the College Football Playoff championship.
College football's top two programs will once again meet to decide the national championship next Monday after No. 1 Alabama and No. 2 Clemson both easily dispatched with their semifinal opponents Saturday.
It is the fourth straight season the Crimson Tide and Tigers will meet in the playoff. Alabama beat Clemson 24-6 in a semifinal last season, and the teams split their two meetings in the title game in 2016 and 2017.
Alabama reached the championship game for a fourth straight year with a 45-34 win over Oklahoma on Saturday in the Orange Bowl. Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban will be looking for a record seventh national championship.
Alabama has been favored in its last 53 games and 126 of its past 127. The Crimson Tide were a consensus 1-point underdog at Georgia in 2015.
Barring dramatic line movement, Clemson will be an underdog for only fifth time in the last three seasons.
The Tigers rolled past Notre Dame 30-3 in the Cotton Bowl on Saturday to advance to their third national championship game in the last four years. The Clemson route was costly for the betting public, which sided heavily with the underdog Fighting Irish. Among several large bets on Notre Dame was a $60,000 money-line wager placed Saturday morning at a William Hill sportsbook.
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(Excerpt) Read more at espn.com ...
Clemson Seniors Excited For Fourth Opportunity To Face Alabama
Wow. Oklahoma made a game of it. I stopped watching at halftime. I figured ‘bama was gonna roll up 70 points. What did they do? Bring in their third stringers for the second half? Did Joe Namath start the second half?
The competition is weak every year. GA was the best. Clemson will be a handful. OK was weak. Looked like a high school team on defense Bama needs to not make mistakes to beat Clemson. Bama could score at will against Ok but that won’t be the case against a good defense like Clemson.
They slowed the tempo down once they had the game won.
Alabama captured their fourth straight National Championship berth with a 45-34 win over the Oklahoma Sooners in the 2018 Capital One Orange Bowl.
Josh Jacobs led the Tide in rushing with 98 yards on 15 carries. Tua Tagovailoa went 24-of-27 for 318 yards and four touchdowns. Devonta Smith led the Tide in receiving with 106 yards on 6 receptions and a touchdown.
The Tide started the game off on fire as they racked up 28 unanswered points and hoped out to a 28-0 lead. Kyler Murray and Oklahoma’s offense looked stunned until they got some control of the game and drove the field to get on the board in the second quarter with a running score by Trey Sermon.
Both teams would trade field goals before heading into halftime with the score being 31-10.
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I got a kick out of Oklahoma kicking off from their own goal line after incurring two personal fouls after scoring a touchdown.
Sooners’ “defense” was one of the worst I’ve seen in a game this major. And their O-line was outmatched on nearly every play. Murray is fun to watch, but should stick with baseball. He wouldn’t last 6 games in the NFL.
The Sooners found out that there are no chumps in the SEC. Alabama will discover that not all teams in the ACC are chumps.
I think Kyler Murray was great and proved he deserved the Heisman Trophy.
Going to be a number of backup QBs transferring, including Jalen Hurts of Alabama. Great kid who maintained a great attitude when he was beat out by Tua.
I will be interested to see which QB will transfer to Washington State and lead the nation in passing next year. Mike Leach will likely have several to choose from.
Yes, but he has no future in the NFL. He should play for the A's.
Clemson scored only 30 points against a wean ND. Not a very impressive game if you really watched it.
It is not a championship. It is a 4 team beauty contest put on by ESPN like every year.
Make an 8 team Championship of league Champions and decide it on the field.
Did anyone besides me watch ESPN2’s command center broadcast of the game? Multiple camera angles, cameras on the coaches, and real time statistics. It was very enjoyable.
Yes.
If Tua hadn't had that lousy game against Georgia, I'd disagree.
Murray earned it.
Yes. I watched most of the game and didn't think they were as good as I've been reading that they are.
The top SEC teams have blasted Big 10 teams. Michigan was embarrassed by Florida.
Auburn crushed Perdue, 63-14.
Washington should handle Ohio State pretty well.
“Clemson scored only 30 points against a wean ND.”
What was ND doing in the final four anyway.
I watched it. Clemson played backups in many positions starting towards the end of the 3rd quarter. Had they kept the entire 1st team in, they would have scored two more TDs.
I support more teams in the playoffs and fewer non-relevantt bowl games.
The pattern now is potential pro players sit out the bowl games if they re not championship playoffs so their little tushes don’t get hurt and ruin their careers after playing 24-36 games in college.
I won’t watch bowl games any more, where a team has 4 players refuse to play. How do they think they got into the bowl game in the first place. That’s fraud or false advertising.
WV did that to me yesterday and they got their asses handed to them. Let the sponsors suffer and the networks and the NCAA will take away their scholarships for the game or the rests of the school year if they don’t play.
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