ARLINGTON, Texas — Hours after the College Football Playoff selection committee cemented the top four teams, Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly was asked the million-dollar question: How do you stop or limit the Alabama offense?
Kelly equivocated, noting his staff hadn’t evaluated the Crimson Tide game plan-wise, since he had just learned his team’s fate. He ruminated on limiting big plays and ball control offense but admitted that, following their weekly scores, “they have been a buzz saw against everybody.”
The real answer, unless you’re Clemson — and who knows if even that’s enough? — is that there’s nothing you can do. There is no stopping or slowing down this Crimson Tide offense.
No. 4 Notre Dame learned that firsthand on Friday at AT&T Stadium, doing its best but ultimately failing to do enough to slow the top-ranked Crimson Tide’s Heisman Trophy trio, as Alabama cruised to a 31-14 win in the CFP semifinal at The Rose Bowl Game Presented by Capital One.
In October 2012 — just months before the Crimson Tide bullied the Fighting Irish in the 2013 BCS National Championship Game — Nick Saban asked “Is this what we want football to be?” as the sport was engulfed by the spreading flames of hurry-up, no-huddle, spread offenses. Over the next few years, the college football world answered with a resounding “yes.”
This is the end result, as Saban fully embraced the philosophy. An offense with three legitimate Heisman Trophy candidates: quarterback Mac Jones, running back Najee Harris and receiver DeVonta Smith (not to mention one who has been on the sideline because of injury, receiver Jaylen Waddle). You want yards, points and offense over everything? Saban obliged, and is doing it better than anyone else, with an unfair collection of offensive talent.
Eight years removed from their last meeting, Alabama again dominated Notre Dame, but instead of physically overpowering the Irish, they just ran past, around and — in Harris’ case — over them. Longtime Alabama loyalists who yearn for Saban’s old suffocating defenses may quibble with how many yards and points the Tide have allowed this season, but even they can be pleased with this defensive performance, which held Notre Dame under 400 yards.
Friday’s semifinal started in predictable fashion. The Tide raced to a two-touchdown lead, and Heisman candidate No. 3, Harris, dropped jaws as he hurdled over Nick McCloud, leading many to wonder if the game would even be competitive. To Notre Dame’s credit, it seemed so for a second. An eight-plus minute drive halved the lead and though a missed field goal near first half’s end left them with a 21-7 deficit, the Irish still appeared to have a flicker of hope as the third quarter began.
Inevitably, Heisman candidate No. 2 (Jones) and Heisman candidate No. 1 (Smith) proved too much to handle. The two connected seven times for 130 yards and three touchdowns. We’ll find out on Tuesday which of those two finalists (or Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence or Florida quarterback Kyle Trask) take home the Heisman, though to anyone who has watched closely this season, it’s hard to figure someone more deserving than Smith, who leads the country in receptions and receiving yards and touchdown catches.
The final numbers were good, if not as staggering as they usually are: 31 points, 437 yards a 17-point margin of victory. Clemson and Ohio State operate in a similar talent stratosphere to the Crimson Tide, and that gives them a better chance against this historic collection of talent than Notre Dame had on Friday.
But if they’re looking for ways to stop Alabama, they can save the effort. Their best bet may simply be trying to keep up, turning it into the kind of shootout Saban cautioned against eight years ago. This isn’t what he wanted football to be, but he’s on the verge of winning a national championship that way.