Texas was just one yard from tying the Cotton Bowl but a failed sweep and subsequent sack and fumble clinched the game for Ohio State.
What happened on Texas’ failed toss sweep? Steve Sarkisian points to blocking, while Ohio State player says film study prepared Buckeyes for that play.
Big plays swing College Football Playoff semifinal in Ohio State’s favor
ARLINGTON, Texas – Steve Sarkisian got cute, but it sure didn’t look pretty.
Sarkisian earns acclaim for being one of the nation’s premier play callers, but he fell into a familiar coaching trap Friday of trying to show just how very smart he is with a play sheet in his hands.
Only, Ohio State’s defense made Sarkisian look foolish at the close of the Buckeyes’ 28-14 victory in the Cotton Bowl.
The scene: First-and-goal from the 1-yard line. Texas trailed by a touchdown late in the fourth quarter. The Longhorns needed to move three feet to tie this College Football Playoff semifinal.
First down: Texas audibles into a Power-I formation, but Ohio State stuffs a run up the middle.
No harm. Three more tries for three feet.
Second down: Sarkisian goes way too deep into his bag. He calls a toss sweep off left tackle out of the shotgun formation. The Buckeyes had it defended, dead to rights. Safety Caleb Downs shot into the backfield untouched and nearly ended the play then and there.
Texas ball carrier Quintrevion Wisner escaped Downs, but he made no headway toward the end zone, as his run pushed further to the sideline. Safety Lathan Ransom pinballed off Texas left tackle Kelvin Banks Jr. Ransom wrapped up Wisner 7 yards behind the line of scrimmage.
That’s how you go from first-and-1 to third-and-8.
Two plays later, Ohio State’s Jack Sawyer ended Texas’ comeback hopes with a strip-sack of Quinn Ewers. Sawyer scooped up the fumble and lugged his prize 83 yards into the end zone.
“Just a miraculous play,” linebacker Cody Simon said of Sawyer’s strip-sack and score. “That moment is going to live in history forever.”
Absolutely, it will, but Texas got off into the weeds two plays previously, when Ransom’s tackle for loss put the Longhorns behind the 8-ball.
Steve Sarkisian defends play call that sent Texas in reverse
Sarkisian stood by his toss sweep play call.
“That’s one of those plays if you block it all right, you get in the end zone,” Sarkisian said. “We didn’t.”
Sarkisian didn’t fool Ohio State, either.
To hear Downs tell it, the Buckeyes were ready for that toss sweep.
“You could see it on film,” Downs said. “They like that play when big moments come up.”
No sooner had Ewers received the snap than Downs made a beeline for Wisner. Downs pushed Wisner off course before Ransom cleaned up the tackle.
“They’ve done that throughout the year – crack tosses to the boundary,” Downs said. “I’m just happy that, when I missed the tackle, Lathan made it.”
Ransom’s reflexes weren’t quite as quick as Downs’ right after the snap, but he wasn’t far behind his teammate. Ransom didn’t let Banks, Texas’ hulking tackle whom NFL scouts like, slow him up for long.
“No one really loafs into big plays,’ Simon said. ‘He pulled his trigger and made a huge play.’
What went wrong on that second-down run, from Wisner’s perspective?
“I’m not even sure,” the Texas running back said.
Not his fault. He never had a chance.
“If you give us an inch, we’ll defend it,” Simon said. “That was the epitome of that right there.”
Big plays give Ohio State the edge on Texas in Cotton Bowl
Texas never led this game, but it battled against an opponent that’s emerged throughout the playoff as the front-runner to win the national championship. Midway through the fourth quarter, the score stood knotted at 14.
“They made their plays when it counted most,” Texas linebacker David Gbenda said.
Such as quarterback Will Howard’s 18-yard run on a fourth-down play to set up the Buckeyes’ go-ahead score in the fourth quarter.
Or, TreVeyon Henderson’s 75-yard touchdown on a screen pass.
Texas had tied the score at 7 before kicking a touchback with 29 seconds left before halftime. Ohio State could go into the locker room tied, but why not try something safe and see what happened?
Any football novice knows to expect a screen in that situation. Sure enough, Buckeyes offensive coordinator Chip Kelly dialed one up.
And, sure enough, Texas fell for it.
Ohio State’s two offensive tackles stayed home to block, while the Buckeyes’ three interior linemen leaked forward to block for the screen. Four Texas defenders rushed toward Howard while the screen slowly developed. At the final moment, Howard flipped a completion to Henderson. The Buckeyes had Texas walled off.
Henderson found the seam and, boom, he was gone. Gone for a score, untouched.
“He’s one of the fastest people I’ve ever seen,” Buckeyes wide receiver Emeka Egbuka said of Henderson.
Texas’ defense looked creaky on that screen pass, before its blocking became “leaky,” as Sarkisian put it, on that second-down toss sweep one yard from the end zone, two quarters later.
But, why call a high-risk run to the boundary on second down?
Earlier in the game, Sarkisian effectively dialed up a quarterback run for backup quarterback Arch Manning to move the chains on fourth down during a drive that ended in a touchdown. Reinserting Manning might have worked near the goal line. Or, another run or two inside the tackles might have done the trick.
We’ll never know. We do know the Buckeyes weren’t the slightest bit duped by a toss sweep that probably seemed clever to Sarkisian when he called it, but looked awfully silly and sloppy in action.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer. Subscribe to read all of his columns.