5:02 pm | December 1, 2018 | Go to Source | Author:
ATLANTA — Jalen Hurts came off the bench for an injured Tua Tagovailoa to lead Alabama to a come-from-behind victory over Georgia in the SEC Championship Game on Saturday night in Atlanta.
Tagovailoa, considered the Heisman Trophy frontrunner, rolled his ankle and had to be helped off the field with just over 11 minutes left in the fourth quarter, but he is expected to be OK, coach Nick Saban said afterward.
“We’re going to evaluate his ankle tomorrow, but I don’t think it’s going to be something that would keep him out,” Saban said. “Maybe for a little while, but we probably won’t practice for a couple of weeks anyways.”
Before his injury, Tagovailoa was having arguably his worst game of the year, competing just 10 of 25 passes for 164 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions.
But whatever his status moving forward, Alabama owes Saturday’s 35-28 win to the play of Hurts, who was a two-year starter and won an SEC Offensive Player of the Year award before his benching this season.
Hurts calmly guided the Crimson Tide to a game-tying touchdown with a 10-yard pass to Jerry Jeudy, capping a 16-play, 80-yard drive that consumed more than seven minutes.
After Georgia was stuffed on a fake punt near midfield, Hurts took matters into his own hands for the winning score. Spotting an opening up the middle, he took off and weaved his way into the end zone for a 15-yard touchdown with 1:04 left that gave Alabama the lead and all but guaranteed its spot in the college football playoff this season.
Hurts finished 7-of-9 for 82 yards and a touchdown and had five carries for 28 yards and a score.
The performance came in the same building and against the same team that he was benched for in favor of Tagovailoa at halftime of last year’s national championship game.
Hurts was 26-2 as the starter before this season, when Tagovailoa beat him for the starting job. Hurts played in mop-up duty this season, appearing in 10 games before Saturday.
“I’ve probably never been more proud of a player than Jalen,” Saban said. “It’s unprecedented to have a guy that won as many games as he won, I think 26 or something, over a two-year period, start as a freshman, only lose a couple of games this whole time that he was the starter, and then all of the sudden he’s not the quarterback.
“How do you manage that? How do you handle that? You’ve got to have a tremendous amount of character and class to put the team first, knowing your situation is not what it used to be, and for a guy that’s a great competitor, that takes a lot.”
Hurts, for his part, was reserved afterward, deferring to Saban’s diagnosis of the win.
Asked what it felt like to contribute to the win, he said it was “like breaking my silence.”
“I haven’t said anything all year,” he said. “But this team has worked really hard.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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