Hurricanes ‘deliver a knockout blow’ against Ohio State to win Cotton Bowl
The Miami Hurricanes watched as their lead slowly began to slip away.
Fourteen points down to seven, then down to three.
The Ohio State Buckeyes, the defending national champions, weren’t going to go down this easy — not this team, not at this stage of the season.
So when Miami’s defense finally got a stop in the second half, putting the ball back in the offense’s hands with just less than six minutes left to play, there was a simple message in the huddle.
“We just wanted to deliver a knockout blow,” center James Brockermeyer said. “Seize the moment.”
What unfolded afterward was a possession of perseverance and determination, of heart, of belief — all the adjectives the Hurricanes have preached about their team on full display when it was needed the most.
Ten plays. Seventy yards. A pair of crucial third-down conversions. Five precious minutes drained from the clock.
And the knockout blow: A 5-yard rushing touchdown from running back CharMar “Marty” Brown with 55 seconds left.
A Jakobe Thomas interception two plays later to clinch No. 10 Miami’s 24-14 upset win over No. 2 Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl on Wednesday at AT&T Stadium to advance to the College Football Playoff semifinals.
“Just score a touchdown,” offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson said. “We didn’t want to leave the game up to doubt. I was going to be as aggressive as I needed to be to try to get the ball in the end zone.”
That meant going to the smashmouth approach on offense that has been working so well in the postseason. Miami won its playoff opener against Texas A&M by riding Mark Fletcher Jr. down the stretch. They kept it on the ground for the most part on the decisive drive Wednesday as well.
It began with Fletcher breaking off a 19-yard gain — his longest rush of the game — to get Miami to midfield. Another Fletcher run and a Carson Beck scramble put Miami at third and 3 from the Ohio State 44 with 4:21 left to play. Beck’s short pass to Brown went for 5 yards to move the chains.
Brown, who was a nonfactor in Miami’s first-round win over Texas A&M and hadn’t touched the ball Wednesday before that final drive, took over from there. He barrelled forward for a 13-yard gain to get Miami to the Ohio State 26. Then a 1-yard run brought the game to the two-minute timeout.
A 5-yard run then set up another third down 1:53 left. Instead of run again on third and 4, Dawson set up a tunnel screen to CJ Daniels. Beck hit it perfectly. Daniels gained 13 yards. Ohio State called its final timeout with 1:46 left on the clock.
“Coach dialed it up and said the ball was coming to me,” Daniels said. “It’s just a trust thing. At the end of the day, I’m gonna go get them gritty yards.”
Added Dawson: “CJ is a very reliable dude, and that was elite because he hit that thing fearless. You can’t run a total screen if you’re not fearless, and there’s a total disregard for your body that you have to have to be great at that screen. He has the intentional for it to do that. I knew, by the nature of the defense they were playing, that we’d have a chance. I thought he might score, and he almost got out, but he hit it. He was not going to not get that first down.”
Two more runs by Brown later, and Miami was in the end zone. The lead was back to double digits with less than a minute left to seal the victory and keep Miami’s postseason journey alive.
“This game leaned more towards Fletcher and Marty, that combination, because of how big and physical Ohio State was,” Hurricanes coach Mario Cristobal said. “This was going to have to be a slug-it-out, contact, balance, yards after contact type of game. And those guys, they did a great job.”
This story was originally published January 1, 2026 at 1:08 AM.