In a dramatic end to this contest, Tommy Armstrong finished off a 38 seconds 91-yard drive by finding Brandon Reilly for a 30-yard touchdown and Nebraska handed Michigan State its first loss of the season.
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Starting at his own 9, Armstrong hit Jordan Westerkamp for passes of 28 and 33 yards.
The Spartans won’t soon forget how Reilly went out of bounds and came back in to make the catch. Officials determined Michigan State cornerback Jermaine Edmondson forced Reilly out of bounds, making him eligible. As Mark Dantonio said, “we had too many loose plays”. They’re studying themselves and they have discipline in place and they coach them up. Armstrong rallied the Cornhuskers from 12 points down in the last 4 ½ minutes.
6. The team with the best overall winning percentage [excluding exempted games] shall be the representative.
“All the little things we do, all the practice and all the drills coach (Tony) Elliott has us doing, it clicked probably in the middle of the year last year”, Gallman said. “But we want to win the Triple Crown”. Two plays later, he found Reilly for the winning score. “We didn’t worry about it. We kept moving forward”.
– Derrick Henry ran for 210 yards and three touchdowns, and Alabama (7-1) held Leonard Fournette to just 31 yards on 19 carries.
The Spartans got a final chance, but Cook passed out of bounds from the Nebraska 41 as time ran out.
Whereas the Spartans are slightly behind the Horned Frogs in the AP Poll, they’re 13 points behind No. 13 Utah while having a few breathing room in front of the 15th-ranked Wolverines, who have 683 points.
During the week, Nebraska AD Shawn Eichorst had to do the unprecedented: Release a statement of support for a coach in his first year. “The kids earned this win tonight”. “We’ve taken it game-by-game, prepared the same way and gotten these results”. Those things are so haunting.
Despite being unbeaten on the season, the Michigan State Spartans were not in the first final four rankings for the College Football Playoffs. On Monday, athletic director Shawn Eichorst responded to fan angst by giving Riley a vote of confidence.
Powered by ACC-leading quarterback Deshaun Watson the Tigers have put up 567 and 623 yards in their last two games, with the latter even more impressive considering the Wolfpack owned the third-best defense in the country before last week’s matchup. It lost on a Hail Mary against BYU, in overtime against Miami and then by five combined points against Illinois, Wisconsin and Northwestern.
Earlier this week, Fisher told reporters he was unsure if Golson or Cook was healthy enough to play, but recognized he has the benefit of depth on his roster.
The kickoff team is back to bad habits: Underrated in this loss were the frequent short fields MSU had to defend.
Watson has completed 70.3% of his passes for 1,936 yards and 20 touchdowns compared to just seven interceptions with just under 400 rushing yards and an additional four scores on the ground. Quarterback Travis Wilson ran 3 yards for a touchdown with 3:27 left in the fourth quarter after the Utes had gone scoreless in the second half. Aaron Burbridge, Cook’s favorite target, caught 10 passes for 164 yards and a touchdown. They beat two of the weakest Big Ten teams, Purdue and Rutgers, by narrow margins and needed the play of the year from Jalen Watts-Jackson to beat Michigan on a last-second botched punt.
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The improbable Huskers comeback came after the Spartans looked like they had the game firmly in hand when a Gerald Holmes’ touchdown run gave them a 38-26 lead with 4:16 to go.
