Ohio State vs Alabama College Football Playoff National Championship prediction and game preview.
Ohio State vs Alabama: College Football Playoff National Championship Broadcast
Date: Monday, January 11, 2021
Game Time: 8:00
Venue: Hard Rock Stadium, Miami Gardens, FL
Network: ESPN
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Ohio State (7-0) vs Alabama (12-0) Game Preview
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Three Reasons Why You Should Watch The College Football Playoff National Championship
– It’s Ohio State playing against Alabama. They’re two of the mightiest of the mighty college football programs, and at the moment – along with Clemson – they’re part of the three teams going that can reasonably set the expectations at the unrealistic national-title-or-failure level going into each campaign.
And yet, these two – and their 25 claimed national championship between them – going at it almost seems like a bit of a twist.
This was the fourth appearance in the College Football Playoff for Ohio State, it’s the sixth trip to the tournament in seven chances for Alabama, and yet in the CFP the two only met in the classic 42-35 Buckeye Sugar Bowl semifinal win in 2015.
Overall, it’s only the fifth meeting all-time with Alabama holding a 3-1 lead.
– Alabama has been unstoppable. It’s Nick Saban’s finest offense yet with a Heisman-finalist-to-Heisman-winner passing combination of QB Mac Jones and WR DeVonta Smith to go along with a running back in Najee Harris who finished sixth in the voting. How good is this attack? Arguably the team’s best player – WR Jaylen Waddle; more on him in a moment – went down early with an ankle injury, and the machine kept on rolling.
The Tide geared down in the College Football Playoff semifinal against Notre Dame, scoring 14 points out of the gate and cruising from there.
In between that and a 38-19 win over Missouri to start the season, the Tide scored 41 or more in every other game, the defense has been terrific – outside of the 52-46 SEC Championship fight with Florida and a fight with Ole Miss – and everything is in place for Saban to win his seventh national championship as a head coach. However, his 2009 team was the only one that finished a season unbeaten.
– Can Ohio State gear up the energy, emotion, and attitude again? It waited a full year to get another crack at the College Football Playoff after losing in painful fashion to Clemson in the Fiesta Bowl to end the 2019 season, and it played at a whole other level in the stunning 49-28 win in the Sugar Bowl.
Motivation can only carry a team so far – these Buckeyes have the talent, too.
Alabama might have the household, superstar names, but Ohio State has QB Justin Fields – who’s coming off his epic six-touchdown pass performance against Clemson – and it has every bit as much NFL talent as the team on the other side of the field.
The problem this year was continuity. The program could never get to 100% after a mediocre start, most of its offensive line was missing late in the year, and 22 players were out for the Big Ten Championship against Northwestern. The Clemson game was as close to normal as it’s been for these Buckeyes, and that’s the X factor in this year’s CFP.
We didn’t quite know what this team was capable of because we hadn’t seen it. It’s now all coming together at just the right time.
College Football Playoff National Championship
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Why Ohio State Will Win The College Football Playoff National Championship
– The Ohio State offensive line is a powerhouse. It was never quite right all year, had just one starter available for the Michigan State game, and still wasn’t 100% its normal self in the Rose Bowl win over Clemson. It hasn’t mattered.
The running game is consistent and thumping, the pass protection has been better than the stats – Justin Fields moves around a whole lot and isn’t afraid to hold on to the ball until late – and if the Buckeye front five performs against Bama like it did against the Tigers, look out.
– Shhhhhhhhhh, it’s the thing no one feels all that comfortable talking about, but …
The top Ohio State skill players might actually be as good as Alabama’s – at least in the backfield.
Alabama has a better overall receiving corps, but the tight ends are even, Chris Olave is a next-level wide receiver – but no, he’s not DeVonta Smith or Jaylen Waddle – and while Najee Harris is a better pro prospect than Trey Sermon, Sermon is on an unstoppable roll over the last few games with 636 yards in the last three games as he grows into more and more of a workhorse.
And then there’s Justin Fields.
He was always great – the guy was a Heisman finalist last year – he just came up with something epic, hitting 79% of his passes for 385 yards and six touchdowns with an interception against Clemson despite taking a blasting to the ribs.
Pro prospect-wise, he’s the best player on the field. He’s the star. He has to be Vince Young in the 2006 Rose Bowl vs. USC, he has to be Deshaun Watson vs. Alabama in 2017, he has to be Joe Burrow vs. Clemson last year.
He’s good enough to be The Guy, because …
– The Alabama defense might be vulnerable. The run defense is amazing, and the secondary is loaded with next-level stars, but the Tide did have their problems.
Yeah, it might seem crazy after the loss to Oklahoma to think that Florida QB Kyle Trask deserved Heisman consideration, but he almost pulled off a win over Alabama in the SEC Championship with 408 yards and three touchdowns. If the Gators had a stronger D, that potentially flips.
Texas A&M might have been rocked in a 28-point loss, but Kellen Mond and the passing game went for 335 yards and three scores. Ole Miss not only ran well on the Bama defense, but Matt Corral was taking target practice, throwing for 379 yards and two scores.
Justin Fields, throw for at least 350 in this, or else.
College Football Playoff National Championship
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Why Alabama Will Win The College Football Playoff National Championship
– Mac Jones will have 350 passing yards by the time you’re done reading this. Ohio State has a top-15 NFL Draft pick corner in Shaun Wade, pro talent throughout the rest of the secondary, and a pass rush that beat up Trevor Lawrence throughout the Rose Bowl … and the Buckeyes will get lit up like your neighbor’s house that still has its Christmas lights up.
Yeah, Lawrence was pressured and battered in the College Football Playoff semifinal – and he threw for 400 yards.
Indiana’s Michael Penix hit the Buckeyes for 491 yards and five scores, and Nebraska and Michigan State were the only two teams that didn’t get to at least 220 yards against the Big Ten’s statistically-worst passing game.
And now there’s a shot Bama gets back its best receiver …
– No, it’s not pretentious to suggest that the Heisman winner might be the team’s second-best wideout. Okay, so DeVonta Smith might really be the team’s top receiver, but if he’s 1, Jaylen Waddle is 1A.
Waddle is even more explosive and more dangerous than DeVonta Smith – 120 yards or more in each of his first four games, including a 142-yard day against Texas A&M and 161 against Georgia – but he suffered an ankle injury on the opening kickoff of the Tennessee game. He’s a game time decision, but if he’s able to go at all … uh oh.
The Bama passing game has been just fine without him, mainly because Smith raised his game to a whole other level once Waddle went down. Mac Jones had the most efficient passing season in college football history, RB Najee Harris takes the pressure off with the ground game and as a short-range receiver, and the offense as a whole should keep on rolling.
Again, for all of the amazing things Ohio State did against Clemson, the D got hit hard.
– Lost in all the big things done by the Alabama offense is a defense that’s been tremendous or most of the year. It was the best in the SEC at taking the ball away, it led the league in tackles for loss, and it wasn’t bad against the run.
Granted, most teams were too busy throwing it to work on the running side of things, but Ohio State is going to give the ground game a shot. The Buckeye passing attack is fantastic, but it’s the run that makes things to with over 200 yards in every game and over 300 in the last three Big Ten games before rolling for 254 against Clemson.
No one gets physical against this Bama defensive front. It’s not a vintage Tide run D like some of the previous brick walls under Nick Saban, but it’s more than good enough to force enough third-and-longs to make the Buckeye offense press.
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What’s Going To Happen in the College Football Playoff National Championship
Is Ohio State going to be 2014 Ohio State or 2014 Oregon.
2014 Oregon couldn’t have been more loose, more salty, and more focused to take on Florida State in first ever College Football Playoff game. It entered the Rose Bowl with a swagger, an attitude, and a fight after being tired of the finesse label. One 59-20 win later, the Ducks became the hot thing going into the College Football Playoff National Championship.
But once they got to Dallas, everything started to tighten up.
The team wasn’t quite as outgoing. It wasn’t quite as playful. It wasn’t quite as edgy – at least in a good way. It’s as if it kicked in that, all of a sudden, this was about to get very, very real.
On the flip side, if there’s ever been a more chilled and confident team for a big game that that Ohio State bunch, I haven’t seen it.
To a man, each one just assumed it was a done deal, and it started from the head coach. To paraphrase Urban Meyer, “look, we’ve got this.”
42-20 Ohio State. National champion.
Beating Clemson to get redemption for last year’s Fiesta Bowl was everything to this 2020 Ohio State team.
The program was desperate to get back on that field as soon as humanly possible to right the wrong after coming so achingly close to playing for it all. It was their all-consuming focus, and it all came roaring out in New Orleans on New Year’s Day.
But was that it? Can the team possible muster up the same fire and focus?There’s still one more game to play.
To add another comp to the mix, the 1980 US Olympic hockey team still had to beat Finland for the gold medal after beating the USSR.
Alabama is hardly going to be complacent.
It only seems like Nick Saban wins the national championship every year, but Bama wasn’t even in last year’s College Football Playoff and got rim-rocked in the 2018 season national championship in that 44-16 nightmare against Clemson in Santa Clara.
It might seem silly to put it this way, but Alabama has only won one national title since 2015 and lost two since then.
Ohio State might have been working all year to get back to the College Football Playoff and win a game – especially against Clemson. Alabama has been working for two years to win it all again.
To wear out the comparison thing, maybe think of Ohio State as 2016 Clemson.
That team barely lost the 2015 national championship to Alabama, came in totally focused to start 2016, and … it had its share of issues.
The Tigers dealt with a should’ve-lost squeaker of a win against NC State, got by a solid Florida State team, and lost to Pitt in a wild firefight. The 42-35 win over Virginia Tech in the ACC Championship wasn’t exactly confidence-inspiring.
But it came out and destroyed Ohio State in the College Football Playoff semifinals, and Deshaun Watson led a game-winning drive for the ages to beat Alabama for the national title.
This Ohio State team had a whole lot of issues to get to this point, but it’s here.
It has the quarterback, it has the momentum, and it has the offense to keep up with Alabama.
Expect a classic to close out a tumultuous 2020 college football season with something amazing that comes down to who has the ball last. It’s a true flip-a-coin pick, but …
College Football Playoff National Championship: Ohio State vs Alabama Prediction, Line
Ohio State 45, Alabama 41
Bet on Ohio State vs Alabama with BetMGM
Alabama -8, o/u: 75
ATS Confidence out of 5: 3
Straight Up Confidence out of 5: 1
– CFN Experts Picks: CFP National Championship
Must See Rating: 5
5: 2021 College Football Playoff National Championship
1: 2020-2021 college football bowl season
College Football Playoff National Championship History
Jan. 13, 2020 LSU 42, Clemson 25
Jan. 7, 2019 Clemson 44, Alabama 16
Jan. 8, 2018 Alabama 26, Georgia 23 OT
Jan. 9, 2017 Clemson 35, Alabama 31
Jan. 11, 2016 Alabama 40, Clemson 34
Jan. 12, 2015 Ohio State 42, Oregon 20
