On Saturday the top-ranked Tigers beat No. 10 North Carolina 45-37 to win the ACC championship and punch their tickets to the College Football Playoff.
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Watson’s 420 total yards and five touchdowns are records for the conference title game and assure the Tigers (13-0) a spot in the College Football Playoff, which has had them slotted No. 1 since the first rankings were released November 3.
“Absolutely. I mean, we’ve got three top-10 teams in this league”.
After scoring on a 17-yard pass play from Marquise Williams to Ryan Switzer, the Tar Heels onside kicked and recovered the ball. They tried another onside kick and this time Clemson recovered and ran out the clock.
Completing 26-of-42 pass attempts for 289 yards with three touchdowns against one interception in addition to 131 rushing yards and two more scores on the ground, Watson showed the country why the Tigers offense is so hard to contain.
As they were looking for the upset in this one, North Carolina would strike first, banging through a 30-yard field goal with just after nine minutes to go. “They were wrong. That’s all I’m going to say about it – they were wrong”.
“I don’t know if it’s off, but it’s going to help for sure”, Venables said.
After Williams cut the lead to 35-23 on a 1-yard TD run, the Tigers got a scare when Watson took a shot to the side of his helmet with 29 seconds left in the third quarter on a short run. Hood tops team rushing with 18 yards, four carries, no touchdowns. Clemson was ranked second and the Tar Heels eighth, marking the first-ever meeting of top 10 teams in ACC history.
It was an impressive week highlighted by the big win over then No. 2 Maryland on Tuesday for the North Carolina Tar Heels.
As ACC commissioner John Swofford honored Swinney and Watson, the game MVP, after Clemson’s victory, the quarterback flashed a quick Heisman pose that was caught on the stadium’s video board.
“I most definitely do”, the Tar Heels’ fourth-year coach said Friday at a news conference.
Swinney also had high praise for a largely-partisan Clemson crowd that comprised most of the ACC title game record 75,514, saying it felt like a home crowd. Carolina lost 52-7 at Clemson in 2006; won 21-16 in Chapel Hill in 2010; lost 59-38 at Clemson in 2011 and lost 50-35 at Clemson in 2014. North Carolina retook the lead when Ryan Switzer caught a 3-yard pass with 3:52 remaining in the second.
With a little over a minute left, the Tar Heels had yet to give up hope. Still, three of their drives were under one minute and many more were barely over the minute mark.
“University police and administrators are investing allegations that Clemson students were involved in a disturbance in Charlotte while tailgating at the ACC Championship Game, and we have been told that at least one person was injured and property damaged”, a Clemson spokeswoman told the station.
Clemson scored on three consecutive drives, marching 68, 97 and 36 yards, to turn a 16-14 second quarter deficit into a 35-16 third quarter lead. “You’ve got to keep playing, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do”. Teasdall ran the ball for four yards when Clemson needed 15 for the first down. From a pure statistical standpoint, the Tar Heels were dominated the entire game, as head coach Dabo Swinney’s team finished with 608 yards of offense, compared with UNC’s 382.
One might argue that the officials didn’t have a good angle on the play and it appeared offsides.
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“That was championship football”, Swinney said. And according to the rules, determining whether a kickoff team was offside at the time of the kick is not a reviewable play.
