- Benching a good quarterback is a tough call to make, but Nick Saban embraced bold moves. Steve Sarkisian should consider the same.
- Juggling Quinn Ewers, Arch Manning a blessing, not a nightmare, for Texas.
- Heisman Trophy drama continues after Travis Hunter wins award.
Saban benched a quarterback who had a 25-2 record as his starter at halftime of the national championship game against Georgia at the end of the 2017 season.
Winning move.
Jalen Hurts watched from the sideline while true freshman Tua Tagovailoa rallied Alabama past a 13-point halftime deficit in that title tilt against Georgia. The Crimson Tide won 26-23 in overtime when Tagovailoa made one of the most memorable throws in Alabama history, a 41-yard touchdown strike on second-and-26.
Steve Sarkisian was still a year away from becoming Saban’s offensive coordinator when the GOAT made that quarterback decision, but surely Sark knows the story, and the Texas coach would do well to remember it as his fifth-seeded Longhorns set off on their College Football Playoff course.
Like Alabama in that 2017 season, the Longhorns are blessed with two talented quarterbacks. And, like Saban, the time might come when a situation calls for Sarkisian to trigger a change. Will he dare be as bold as his former boss?
Quinn Ewers brought Texas to the dance, although Texas needed an assist from Arch Manning while Ewers missed two games in September with an abdominal injury. Manning, in two seasons as a backup, has amassed more experience than Tagovailoa had before he rescued Alabama.
It didn’t take a genius to recognize Tagovailoa’s talent, but coaches tend to detest quarterback changes. It’s easier to bench a quarterback when he stinks. Hurts didn’t stink. He’d done almost nothing but win for two seasons, but Saban recognized his team needed a spark and probably would lose if he didn’t make a change.
Ewers finished the regular season playing on a bum ankle, but even when he’s full speed, Manning offers more mobility.
Because of his surname, Manning creates a unique quarterback controversy – one that Sarkisian attempts to ignore. The Texas coach said recently on “The Rich Eisen Show” that he’d experience an “emotional nightmare” if he paid attention to media’s views on Texas’ quarterback situation.
“I’m not really one to buy into the opinions of others or the criticism of others that I would never ask advice from,” Sarkisian said during that interview.
Certainly, it’s fine – recommended, even – that Sarkisian tune out us hacks, as long as he doesn’t tune out reality, too, if Texas finds itself needing a spark the playoff.
With Ewers taking most of the snaps, Texas twice lost to Georgia, the only playoff team it faced all season. Those losses should not be pinned squarely on Ewers. He had plenty of help in losing to Georgia in the SEC championship game. Ewers played splendidly throughout the first half, but too many drops by his receivers and an onslaught of penalties limited Texas to just a three-point halftime lead. Ewers didn’t play as well after halftime, and Georgia rallied behind backup quarterback Gunner Stockton and a committed ground attack after losing starter Carson Beck to injury.
Might the Longhorns have won that game if Sarkisian had benched Ewers in the second half in favor of Manning? Maybe, maybe not, and it really doesn’t matter, because the selection committee awarded Texas an enviable avenue toward the semifinals.
Sarkisian built trust in Ewers the past three seasons. He’s a good quarterback who sometimes plays great. The point here isn’t to bash a quarterback who’s expected to be selected in the first or second round of the NFL draft in the spring.
Turning to Manning if Texas stalls wouldn’t bury Ewers, just as Saban benching Hurts didn’t doom Hurts.
Hurts, after transferring from Alabama, finished as the Heisman Trophy runner-up for Oklahoma in 2019, and he’s enjoyed a standout NFL career, while Tagovailoa is also an NFL starter.
Possessing two good quarterbacks on the same college roster should be a blessing, not a nightmare, but it only helps if a coach will trigger a quarterback change if the situation calls for it.
If Ewers struggles, Sarkisian must take inspiration from Saban.
The playoff favors the bold.
Here’s what else I’m mulling in this “Topp Rope” view of college football:
Email of the week
Gary writes: Another ‘Heistman Award’ has been given, as it hardly means anything anymore. Lamar Jackson, Jayden Daniels and Travis Hunter all have something in common: ‘Heistman Winners’ with three LOSSES! Absurd.
My response: It’s an individual award, not a team award, and, anyway, I wonder what Colorado’s record would have been without Hunter?
Two years ago, Colorado won one game. Hunter helped spearhead a program turnaround, and he uniquely starred at multiple positions. Regardless of whether one thinks Hunter was most deserving of the Heisman, he’s undeniably a special talent who helped turn a laughingstock program into a playoff contender, at warp speed.
I’m of the mind that, between Hunter and Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty, there was no wrong choice for Heisman winner. That didn’t make it an easy choice. I found Jeanty’s season to be most spectacular.
My Heisman ballot went as follows:
1. Ashton Jeanty
2. Travis Hunter
3. Dillon Gabriel
While I considered Jeanty most deserving, Hunter delivered a remarkable season, as well, and I have no significant objection to him winning, other than it’s too bad Jeanty couldn’t be honored, as well, for his historic exploits.
ON THE MOVE: Ranking the top quarterbacks in the transfer portal
LOSER’S TAX: Norvell, Gundy lead coaches with pay cuts bankrolling teams
Three and out
1. Speaking of slight disagreements on award voting, I would have gone in a different direction for SEC coach of the year. The SEC’s coaches chose Vanderbilt’s Clark Lea as the award winner. Understandable, after Lea uplifted Vanderbilt from basement projections into a 6-6 record and an upset of Alabama. However, I considered South Carolina’s Shane Beamer even more deserving. The Gamecocks, picked to finish 13th in the 16-team SEC, went 9-3 against a tough schedule, beat Clemson, and got left on the playoff’s doorstep. I’m surprised Vanderbilt won six games. I’m more surprised South Carolina won nine.
2. Consider this: Just four playoff qualifiers beat at least one playoff team. Those teams are Oregon, Georgia, Ohio State and Clemson. The selection committee valued win-loss record and teams that reached the conference championship games, but the playoff becomes a test of teams’ ability to beat premier opponents. Georgia and Oregon achieved that most often throughout the regular season.
3. Amid reports that Tennessee fans are gobbling up tickets on resale markets for the team’s first-round game at Ohio State, some prankster briefly got Ohio Stadium renamed as ‘Neyland North’ on Apple Maps before it got corrected. There’s probably an Ohio congressman planning to make such a stunt a felony.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer. The ‘Topp Rope’ is his football column published throughout the USA TODAY Network. Subscribe to read all of his columns.
