Click here for Part I.
So the 2012 football season came to an end as they all do nowadays, with the Southeastern Conference on top of the college football world as champions. For the second year in a row, and the third time in four years, it was Alabama, who completely dominated the top-ranked Notre Dame Fighting Irish to win its 15th National Championship (or tenth poll championship or third BCS championship, however you want to look at it). Let's start the Rundown!
(2) Alabama 42, (1) Notre Dame 14
BCS National Championship Game, Miami, FL
While the performance by the Tide wasn't perfect throughout the entire game, the first two quarters of play by Alabama were nearly flawless as the team built an insurmountable 28-0 halftime lead. Notre Dame's defensive front seven, purportedly better than any Alabama faced in the SEC this season, were manhandled and road-graded by the Crimson Tide offensive line in a fashion that suggested that the Irish may have been vastly overrated. Notre Dame's Heisman runner-up Manti Te'o, who is, no doubt, a person of high character who continued to perform for his team in the face of personal tragedy this season, nevertheless was completely exposed by the passing of AJ McCarron and the running of Eddie Lacy and T. J. Yeldon. Lacy and Yeldon repeatedly evaded Te'o, when they weren't running through his arm tackles, and McCarron burned Te'o on a touchdown pass to tight end Michael Williams when every Irish defender expected a run. Notre Dame had not allowed a touchdown drive of over eighty yards all season, but the Tide had four in the game, including a back-breaking 97-yard drive following an acrobatic interception by Hasean Clinton-Dix (assist to Demarcus Milliner for the pass break up). Offensive coordinator Doug Nussmeier called a masterful game, and the Tide offense executed it well. For all of the credit that Nick Saban and Kirby Smart get for defensive scheme and firepower, this Alabama team won the game with an offensive juggernaut that took on the strength of the Irish squad and rendered it impotent. Looking back, it's fair to say that the Alabama defense underwhelmed against LSU, Georgia, Texas A&M, and even had trouble with Ole Miss (keep in mind Alabama's defense still ended the season as the best in the country), but the Tide won those games, and came within a hair's breadth of beating A&M, due to the best offense Alabama has fielded under Saban. Credit for that falls largely upon Barrett Jones, Chance Warmack, D. J. Fluker, Cyrus Kouandjio, Anthony Steen and Michael Williams, the offensive linemen and tight end who blocked their way to a national title.
(21) Louisville 33, (3) Florida 23
Allstate Sugar Bowl, New Orleans, LA
The most surprising outcome of the bowl season apart from the dismantling of Notre Dame by Alabama was Florida's anemic performance in the Sugar Bowl. While props must be given to Cardinals coach Charlie Strong, whose longtime Florida ties certainly helped serve as motivation for this game, the Gators played like they left their hearts in the French Quarter, or maybe back on the field in Tallahassee, where they whipped Florida State back in November. For this Florida squad to win 11 games was an overachievement, given their level of on-field talent and lack of a quarterback who can actually throw a consistent pass. Watching the game, I was reminded of Alabama's Sugar Bowl performance against Utah following the 2008 season. Florida came up one game short of its 2012 goals, like Alabama in 2008, and didn't appear to want to be in New Orleans, and their fans agreed. Maybe Florida should have done the right thing and declined the BCS invitation so that Georgia could take their place. However, much like Alabama in 2008, I don't think you can read too much into this loss. Coach Will Muschamp's focus in the off-season should be discipline. In the team's two losses, the Gators turned the ball over nine times and had 19 penalties. That's not a formula for success.
(9) Texas A&M 41, (11) Oklahoma 13
AT&T Cotton Bowl, Dallas, TX
Perhaps the only way that this victory could have been more fulfilling for the Aggies, coming as it did against a former Big XII rival in the Jerry Dome in Dallas, is if it had come against Texas rather than Oklahoma. Heisman winner Johnny Manziel had probably his best game of the season, which should be troubling to every other team in the SEC West who will have to face the still-improving young quarterback. Manziel had over 500 yards of offense in the game and set a bowl record for most rushing yards by a quarterback with 229 on 17 carries. It should be clear at this point that there is no such thing as a Heisman jinx when the actual best player in the country wins the Heisman. Fortunately, that player was from College Station rather than South Bend. The Aggies will enter the 2013 season as a title contender. It will be interesting to see how they perform with a target squarely on their backs, but regardless, the team's inaugural season in the SEC has been an unqualified success.
Ole Miss 38, Pittsburgh 17
BBVA Compass Bowl, Birmingham, AL
The Rebels rewarded the nearly 60,000(!) fans who traveled to Legion Field to see them take on the Pittsburgh Panthers with a rout to wrap up a 7-6 season in Hugh Freeze's first year. Ole Miss stepped up markedly from a 2-9 effort in 2011 and showed significant improvement as the season progressed, suggesting that the Rebels hired the right man for their job. The most significant victory is still on the horizon though -- it will come in February if Freeze can land top high school prospect Robert Nkemdiche, whose brother plays for the Rebels, in Oxford on National Signing Day.
2012 Bowl Summary
The final bowl breakdown by conference looks like this:
CONFERENCE WINS LOSSES PCT
WAC 2 0 1.000
C-USA 4 1 .800
SEC 6 3 .667
Big East 3 2 .600
ACC 3 2 .600
Pac-12 4 4 .500
Sun Belt 2 2 .500
Big XII 4 5 .444
Independent 1 2 .333
MAC 2 4 .333
Big Ten 2 5 .286
Mountain West 1 4 .200
So, the SEC finished first among the major conferences and third overall (second among conferences that will exist next year). Couple that with the SEC's 7th BCS national championship in a row, and it's easy to see why fans of every other team have "SEC fatigue." That's like saying that the Japanese in World War II had "US Navy fatigue." Getting beaten up and down the field year after year will do that to you. Conference USA had a surprisingly strong performance in bowls that nobody watched. The ACC and Big East did fairly well, with the ACC especially improving over 2011's dismal bowl record. The Big XII finished disappointingly, and the Big Ten was abysmal, falling below even the lowly MAC.
My Final SEC Power Rankings
1. Alabama (13-1) - Four national titles in three years. The Tide bookended the 2012 season with remarkably similar performances against Michigan and Notre Dame, two of the all-time elite teams in the college football pantheon. This is arguably the best five-year run in Alabama history, if not college football history.
2. Georgia (12-2) - Nick Saban said in his postgame comments that Georgia was five yards from "being here." Whether Saban meant here as in Miami or here as in the postgame victory celebration is debatable, but there's no doubt in my mind that both would have been true. Fortunately, Georgia recovered fully from their loss in Atlanta to defeat Nebraska and set themselves up for a title run in 2013.
3. Texas A&M (11-2) - With Manziel under center and Kevin Sumlin at the helm, this team turned into a juggernaut by season's end. The Aggies are the team to watch in 2013.
4. South Carolina (11-2) - Although South Carolina stumbled late in the season, they recovered nicely with wins over Clemson and Michigan.
5. Florida (11-2) - The loss to Louisville took some of the shine off 2012, but the Gators still look to be ahead of schedule in year two under Muschamp.
6. LSU (10-3) - This might be the most disappointing ten-win season in LSU history.
7. Vanderbilt (9-4) - Yes, Vanderbilt. This has to be the ceiling for the Commodores, right? Right?
8. Ole Miss (7-6) - The Rebels are improving, and should be even better next year.
9. Mississippi State (8-5) - New coaches at Auburn and Arkansas likely mean that the Bulldogs' window is closing in the SEC West.
10. Missouri (5-7) - Injuries hampered the Tigers from the beginning, but the stellar success of fellow newbie A&M has to be somewhat galling.
11. Tennessee (5-7) - New coach Butch Jones has his hands full as he tries to take the Volunteers back to the mountaintop.
12. Arkansas (4-8) - Ditto new Arkansas coach Bret Bielema, who will also have to retool the Razorbacks' offense to fit his system.
13. Auburn (3-9) - Auburn's "new" coach Gus Malzahn will have to deal with a talent deficit and a team that quit on the last coach.
14. Kentucky (2-10) - Pity new Wildcats coach Mark Stoops. On the bright side, there's nowhere to go but up.
The Final Word
There's been a lot of talk about Nick Saban and Alabama's program and whether the win signals a dynasty. I think that calling what Saban has done at Alabama a dynasty is fine, although he will be the first to tell you that every team has a life and story of its own. That is the way it has always been, of course. What is more interesting to me is the comparison between Saban's achievements at Alabama with those of other coaches through history, and particularly with Alabama legend Paul W. "Bear" Bryant.
Coach Bryant will always have a place of prominence at Alabama, regardless of what Saban's accomplishments finally turn out to be. Bryant played at Alabama, for a national champion Rose Bowl team no less. He served as head coach for 25 years and won 232 games at Alabama, both records which Saban is unlikely to challenge. Bryant led the Tide during the state's darkest days since the Civil War, when segregation and the Civil Rights struggle were tearing the country apart. He gave Alabamians something to feel positive about, winning six national titles and eventually becoming the nation's all-time winningest college football coach. And Bryant was a larger-than-life figure - a hard-living mountain of a man who wrestled a bear, played against Tennessee with a broken leg, and kicked down a locker room door after returning from the field to find it locked. The Legend of the Bear has all but replaced the man now, and the Legend lives on.
Saban, on the other hand, is so focused on his process and eliminating every distraction that doesn't contribute to its success, that he can seem to the outsider like something less than human - a college football robot. This isn't entirely true - he loves his wife and his children, he cares about his players' success in life, and he has other interests besides his job, like music by the Eagles and driving his boat. But it is easy to view Saban as a college football machine - recruiting blue chip talent, producing NFL players, and winning BCS championships. It is ironic that during Saban's historic run at Alabama that he has defeated three Bryant bugaboos. In two of the three title games Alabama has won under Saban, he has defeated Texas and Notre Dame, two teams that famously plagued Bryant. He never beat either of them, and in fact missed out on additional titles because of it. Under Saban, Alabama has also had its first Heisman winner, something Bryant never was able to accomplish in Tuscaloosa.* Saban is the only coach besides Pop Warner to have won a national title at two different schools. And, of course, he's the only coach to win more than two titles in the BCS era. Saban has won four national titles, including his 2003 win at LSU, which
ties him with Notre Dame's Frank Leahy and USC's John McKay, and puts
him second behind Bryant's six. Can Saban reach that lofty pinnacle? It's awfully hard to do, but there's no one in the country who has a better chance.
However, I told my kids last night after the win that they should remember this moment, as Alabama stands inarguably astride the college football world like a Colossus. I came of age toward the end of Coach Bryant's career/life, and much of my teen and adult life has been spent watching the Tide dabble fleetingly with greatness before sinking back into mediocrity. Saban's arrival at Alabama ushered in another of those eras, rare even for the powerhouses of sports, where sustained greatness is achieved. It won't last forever. It can't. But I believe that most Alabama fans who have gone through the long drought between Bryant and Gene Stallings, and the longer drought between Stallings and Saban, realize that elite success is fleeting, and fans should enjoy it to the fullest while they can.
*Bryant did have a Heisman winner at Texas A&M in 1957 - John David Crow.
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