Eddie Lacy's running keyed a big Alabama comeback win. (John David Mercer-USA TODAY Sports)
Saturday night’s SEC Championship game was an epic battle, but with the game on the line Alabama did what it does best. The Crimson Tide eclipsed Georgia, 32-28 with the power running game of Eddie Lacy and the lightning quick back T.J. Yeldon.
In the end, the duo combined for 334 of Alabama’s 350 rushing yards as well as three scores. With that though, the game was still in doubt in the fourth quarter as the Tide was down 28-25 with the clock rolling under five minutes and the ball on the Georgia 45-yard line. It was then time to abandon the stellar rushing game and lean on the passing attack.
AJ McCarron had thrown only seven passes up to that point and the Crimson Tide had just crossed into Bulldogs territory on the third play of their 12th drive of the game. McCarron faked the play-action into the line to Yeldon and launched his eighth pass over Bulldogs cornerback Damian Swann and into the waiting arms of Amari Cooper for the deciding touchdown.
“They actually, when we were running the ball early on, they were splitting safeties and we were in slot formation most of the time,” Alabama’s Nick Saban said of the strategy behind the idea to go deep at that point. “Even though they were in an eight-man front of sorts, it’s not like when you play man-to-man and actually put another man in the box.”
Swann did not get much of a jab at Cooper as he came off the line of scrimmage, so it was a dead sprint to the end zone. After that, Cooper beat Swann on the sprint and hauled in the catch on the one-yard line for the score.
“It was a big play on third-and-five to get the first down,” said Saban, “We would have gone for it on fourth there I think for sure. Then we took the shot and AJ made a great throw and Coop made a great catch.”
The winning touchdown was set up throughout the second half as Alabama used the running style of Lacy and Yeldon equally to try keep Georgia’s defense off balance and ultimately set up such a play as the game-winner.
“They didn’t do anything new; they just lined up and played inside drill for a while,” said Georgia’s Mark Richt, “We finally got a stop somewhere along the way, but on a couple of drives, I don’t even know if they threw it.”
