MIAMI GARDENS – The fourth quarter proved to be the difference in the 87th Orange Bowl at Hard Rock Stadium.
There was a feel that either No. 5 Texas A&M or No. 13 North Carolina could win this Jan. 2 tilt. It was a really close one for almost the entire game.
Both teams went toe-to-toe with each other. But Texas A&M (9-1 final record) finished off North Carolina (8-4 final record) with a 24-point scoring burst in the final frame.
It turned out to be an exhilarating 41-27 win for one of the nation’s very best teams.
Starting at the 13:51 mark of the fourth quarter, Texas A&M woke right up after its secondary allowed a 75-yard touchdown pass to North Carolina, which put them in a 27-20 deficit.
It was an end-zone connection from Tar Heels sophomore quarterback Sam Howell (18-31, 234, three touchdowns, one interception) to freshman wide receiver Josh Downs (four catches, 91 yards, two touchdowns). It was the extra point from Tar Heels kicker Grayson Atkins (3-for-3 in extra points; 2-for-2 in field goals).
It was enough for Texas A&M to shut down North Carolina from there until the final buzzer.
“There’s an urgency,” said Texas A&M head coach Jimbo Fisher, who is now 3-0 in Orange Bowl games. “You know the game is on the line. Listen, they’re a good team. They’re on scholarship too. They’re going to make plays. What you’ve got to say, okay, that’s all water under the bridge. Let me play the next play. Let me do what I’ve got to do, and there’s an urgency and a caring and a gut-wrenching ability to raise your game to the next level to do your job, no matter how you feel.”
Aggies senior quarterback and IMG Academy alum Kellen Mond (16-26, 232 passing) yards) led a seven-play, 75-yard drive that took three minutes and forty seconds off the clock. He ended it with a 4-yard touchdown run and kicker Seth Small (5-for-5 in extra points; 2-for-2 in field goals) added the extra point to make it 27-27 at the 10:11 mark.
“We started playing up front, we started filling the gaps, started fitting things,” Fisher said.
After that, the Aggies defense went to work and shut down the Tar Heels offense on the next drive. They got their offense the ball back at their own 28 with 9:06 left.
But nothing happened for either team until the game reached the 5:34 mark, when Aggies defensive lineman McKinnley Jackson got a key third down stop to force a Tar Heels punt.
And once the Aggies got the ball back again, it was pay dirt from there.
With 3:44 left, a possible grind-it-out drive suddenly turned into a blistering 76-yard touchdown run from Aggies freshman running Devon Achane, who split a host of Tar Heels defenders en route to his score. The Small extra point gave the Aggies a 34-27 lead at that point.
“First off, I’ve got to thank the O-line for that,” said Achane, who finished the Orange Bowl game with 12 carries for 140 yards and two touchdowns, along with the MVP trophy. “It was a counter play. Jalen, No. 85, Jalen Wydermyer, made a great block. I was just following the block because they made it easy for me. I just thank them, and they made it easy just for me to do my job.”
Mond spoke of how the game-changing play happened.
“Jalen actually gave him a great block, and it was one of the — not going to say the first times, but one of the times that Jalen was actually imposing his will and was actually a lot more physical than sometimes where he can be,” Mond said. “But that just kind of goes to the toughness and just the will that this whole entire team has, and Devon was able to come in here and give us a great spark.”
After Achane’s score, the Aggies defense put the clamps on the Tar Heels offense again. They got the ball back with 2:24 left after forcing a turnover on downs.
“It gave us all a boost,” said Aggies sophomore defensive lineman Demarvin Leal, who had seven tackles in the Orange Bowl. “We were still sitting there trying to fight and fight and fight for that energy that we were trying to get. As as soon as that happened, it just — everybody that you could just feel the energy because that energy is so contagious, so you could feel the energy go through everybody, and it was an amazing outcome.”
From the Tar Heels 38-yard line, it was a quick scoring drive that really iced the game. It took only three plays and 50 seconds, as Achane punched the ball into the end zone on a 1-yard run with 1:34 left.
Small’s fifth and final extra point ensured the game’s final score.
Fisher spoke on his team’s tenacity in the closing moments of the Orange Bowl.
“Our kids work hard. They play hard. It matters to them. They care,” Fisher said. “You don’t put that much work in and then give it up. You learn to raise your game in the fourth quarter…We put them in those situations each and every day and we demand excellence out of them. But I can demand it all I want, they’ve got to get it out of themselves. I have the utmost respect for our players. They rose their game. They did what they had to do on every fourth quarter all year and they take a lot of pride in that.”
SIDE NOTES: Aggies sophomore Ainias Smith caught six passes for 125 yards in the Orange Bowl. He played a huge role in how his team’s 24-point scoring outburst came about in the fourth quarter.
“The whole year we were always pressing on — not even so much pressing but just working on finishing and coming out the second half and just being us, and that’s really all it came down to,” Smith said. “You’ve just got to stay composed and just finish.”
Aggies senior linebacker Buddy Johnson led the team with 10 tackles and one sack in the Orange Bowl.
“Back when the pandemic first hit, there was a lot going on, and then we had social injustice things going on,” Johnson said. “Some of those things pull teams apart, but I think it only made our team stronger. We bonded together a lot more, and I think that was huge for us.”
Johnson spoke on the coaching staff’s level of impact on the entire program.
“I think the pandemic was a lesson for us, and I’m so proud of the coaches, just the way they handled it,” Johnson said. “Some of these coaches are like father figures to some of us. So for them to step up to the plate and just be there for whatever we needed was huge for us. That’s why I think we lay it out on the field for those guys because we know they have our backs.”
PHOTO CREDITS: Keith Forde
