The only excitement of the evening came from Florida State, which has turned the fourth quarter of their contests into the most compelling television this side of Shonda Rhimes. FSU has already carved out a spot on ABC nearly every week and leaves jaws dropped in the fourth quarter anyways.
Shonda Rhimes should develop an ABC series about FSU football. Every episode ends melodramatically in the fourth quarter obviously.
— DJ Meta Dunson (@CerebralSportex) November 24, 2014
FSU has beeninvolved in enough drama to fill out an entire first season's storyboards. This weekend’s episode revolved around FSU staving off an upset by Tyler Murphy and Boston College.
Despite taking a 17-10 lead into the half, Winston and the offense would be denied a scoring drive in the second half until Winston rallied the offense into field goal position with seven seconds remaining. Automatic roboo-kicker Roberto Aguayo sailed the kick through the uprights and the Seminoles once again staved off the playoff reaper’s sickle.
Obviously Florida State is a better team than these teams they stay so close with so what’s going on? My theory; they’re the intellectually gifted student who’s bored with the classwork and has resorted to writing essays and doing homework five minutes before its due.
Florida State just needs a challenge. As long as they don’t fall asleep in class, they should get it from the playoff committee in January.
It also wouldn’t be a week without a #BlameJameis moment of the week.
During the third quarter, Winston was seen “nudging” an official who was standing over the football while he was trying to run a play. Winston has shown the propensity to be a knucklehead, but trying to turn this into an offense that requires ejection or a suspension by the NCAA is overdramatic. Leave that to the professionals.
OKLAHOMA’S BIGGEST FAN: BAYLOR
At a time when running backs are being valued less than at any point in the history of the sport at the NFL level as passing records fall like Jenga Towers, it’s nice to see running backs getting in on the fun. Less than a week after Melvin Gordon trampled all over Nebraska, Samaje Perine, who was supposed to be the second-best freshman on his own positional depth chart rebooted the single-game rushing yardage record.
If Joe Mixon, the second-rated running back prospect in the class of 2014 had not punched the face of a woman who spat on him.
It was a fair trade.
In exchange for Gordon’s record, the football gods also absconded with Ryan Broyle’s FBS career receptions record and dropped into the hands of East Carolina’s Justin Hardy.
However, as upbeat as Perine must have been, nobody was smirking harder than Baylor.
The Bears won the weekend. Perine’s sonic boom rushing the football been a boon for the perception of Baylor
Two weeks ago, Baylor beat the brakes off of Oklahoma 48-14. However, after they inexplicably dropped out of the entire Top 25, it harmed Baylor’s conference strength of schedule argument.
At the same time, Baylor was also mauling Oklahoma State and their freshman quarterback Mason Rudolph 49-28 at home. Coming into the afternoon, Baylor ranked seventh in the nation behind the usual suspects in the top four, TCU and Ohio State.
Earlier in the evening, Ohio State relied on a late surge to put Tevin Coleman and Indiana away, which means the committee will have to decide whether Baylor’s shown enough to get skipped over Ohio State when they unveil their next rankings on Tuesday night.
One factor that could play into their decision is whether the September loss to Virginia Tech is indicative of the team before them in Week 13. However, after the Hokies historically bad offensive performance against Wake Forest, that loss looks even worse.
However, none of that matters if both Alabama and Mississippi State emerge from next weekend’s rivalry games unscathed. Baylor can score touchdowns in under a minute better than anyone in the nation and did so twice in the first quarter against Oklahoma State, but they’re running out of time to jump ahead of top four phantoms of the college football playoff.
DEFENSE OF THE WEEK
For the second week in a row Arkansas pitched a shutout. This time it was against Ole Miss. The most unfortunate part is that Ole Miss’ second loss in three weeks makes the Egg Bowl look like more like yolk on the penultimate weekend of the regular season.
Brett Bielema has been searching for his first SEC win for nearly two seasons and in November he’s suddenly 2-0 against LSU and Ole Miss. Once they get their quarterback situation figured out, they could be a force to be reckoned with.
Greg Schiano’s former Tampa Bay Buccaneers linebacker’s coach Robb Smith has done yeoman's work with what many called subpar talent left behind by Bobby Petrino on the defensive side. After recovering three forced fumbles and picking off three passes against the Rebels, The Hogs rank 24th in total defense and are No. 1 in fourth down defense.
DISHONOR OF THE WEEK
Virginia Tech’s offense got smacked around so hard this weekend that Ohio State probably felt it. One shudders to think what Arkansas’ defense could have done if they had Wake Forest or Virginia Tech on the schedule at home in November. Wake Forest has staged some of the worst offensive performances of the season. Over the weekend, Virginia Tech also helped besmirch the ACC’s reputation by participating in an ignominious 6-3 double overtime contest that the ACC would like stricken from the record of existence.
They didn’t just participate. They lost a game in which neither offense or defense scored in regulation. It’s not like Wake Forest is a defensive juggernaut either. After this weekend, Wake Forest is still the 58th-ranked scoring defense in the nation. The only reason either team could get on the scoreboard was with the aid of college football’s overtime rules setting them up at the 25-yard line.
Afterwards head coach Dave Clawson surmised what happened perfectly, "We put offensive football back 100 years."
At least Wake Forest can chalk it up to growing pains during Clawson’s inaugural season with a true freshman under center against a formidable Bud Foster defense. For Virginia Tech, there is no excuse.
Somewhere Urban Meyer had to be wincing, if he contemplated what the playoff committee thought of their September loss to the Hokies.
