Georgia crushes Michigan 34-11 in 88th Orange Bowl. The bad news for Dawgs? Alabama next | Opinion
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The Georgia Bulldogs outplayed the Michigan Wolverines in their 34-11 College Football Playoff semifinal win in the Orange Bowl on Friday in front of a Michigan-heavy crowd of 66,839 at Hard Rock Stadium.
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The best and original unscripted reality show -- sports -- intersected with real life on Friday night in the 88th Orange Bowl game.
More than 60,000 fans in the mood for revelry filled Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens for a College Football Playoff semifinal game.
It wasn’t nearly as many as the 75,962 new COVID-19 cases reported in Florida earlier Friday, the largest single-day increase since the pandemic began in March 2020.
“Happy New Year!” felt a bit like irony as we welcomed in 2022, sports once again doing its best to get through all of this but not exactly sure how, just like the rest of us.
Five bowl games were canceled for COVID-related reasons, with others disrupted. That included the Miami Hurricanes withdrawing from Friday’s Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas after a virus outbreak, the game going on after a last-minute replacement school was found.
Real life hung in the air in the buildup to the Orange Bowl, a South Florida institution and tradition since 1935. It was born out of the Great Depression and has weathered a World War; it will survive a pandemic.
“Definitely excited to be in Miami, but as we all know it’s a hot spot for COVID,” as Georgia defensive tackle Jordan Davis said upon arrival.
The College Football Playoff was prepared to declare a forfeit, not a postponement, if any of the final four schools competing for the national championship could not field a team on Friday, but all four did.
Unfortunately, only two of the four schools fielded a team worthy of the stage.
In the Orange Bowl, the Georgia Bulldogs crushed the Michigan Wolverines, 34-11.
That was just after the Cotton Bowl outside of Dallas saw dynastic reigning champion Alabama similarly crush upstart Cincinnati, 27-6.
They were two lousy, letdown semifinals -- to an almost embarrassing degree -- if we might betray the generosity of the holiday spirit and get real.
Cincinnati at least was the smaller-level school at the end of a magical year. What excuse might Michigan claim?
There was likely far better competition than these two semifinals on your block New Year’s Eve night as you tried to one-up your neighbor with your Walmart fireworks.
The betting line on Alabama-Geoirgia will be close as the two meet for the national championship on January 10 in Indianapolis. The earliest line, out Friday night, had Georgia a 1 1/2-point pick. That may change.
Nick Saban is 25-1 vs. former assistant coaches of his, including 4-0 vs. Georgia’s Kirby Smart.
One can debate the wisdom or even sanity of the Orange Bowl going ahead with a full stadium Friday amid new COVID cases spiking to record levels in Florida.
One cannot debate this:
In college football, the Southeastern Conference is king, and it isn’t close.
“We think we play in the best conference in the world,” said Smart afterward on the field, accepting the orange-filled OB trophy as red confetti fell.
Alabama and Georgia both hail from the mighty SEC. Routed, as expected, was Cinderella Cincinnati, from the non-Power 5 American conference. Routed, less expectedly, was pedigreed Michigan from the Big Ten.
So much is changing, all around us, as we speak, in college football. Seismic stuff. Tectonic plates are shifting.
The new Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) law redefines amateurism as college athletes are now allowed to be paid.
College football’s transfer portal is tantamount to player free agency, allowing athletes to switch schools without penalty.
The NCAA is weakening, losing control.
Schools are leaving one conference for another.
What hasn’t changed:
The Alabama Crimson Tide and iconic, six-time national champion coach Nick Saban remain large and in charge.
Georgia may be up to the challenge. Well...
Then again, that’s what Georgia thought not quite a month ago, on December 4 in the SEC Championship Game, when the Bulldogs arrived with a changing of the guard on the mind and got schooled by Saban and the Tide, 41-24.
Georgia has one of the epic-great defenses in college football history, as they proved against Michigan Friday.
But Saban solved it.
Just as he solved a Cincinnati squad that, at 13-0, was the only unbeaten team in the final four.
“Power 5 is opinion. 13-0 is fact,” read the signs held by Bearcats fans fans Friday outside of Dallas.
Yes, and, just north of downtown Miami, Wolverines fans were convinced this was the year Michigan might be headed to its first national championship since 1997. Then Georgia -- seeking its first national crown since 1980 -- said, no, sorry.
Now Georgia must solve an Alabama team it has lost to seven times in a row including a few weeks ago.
So much is changing in college football but this absolutely has not until you hear otherwise:
Nick Saban and Alabama rule the kingdom, from on high, looking down.
This story was originally published December 31, 2021 at 11:02 PM.
