The Cincinnati Bearcats led the Georgia Bulldogs for much of the game during Friday’s Peach Bowl, but they only had themselves to blame for their late defeat.
The Bearcats were clinging to a 21-19 lead when they got the ball back with 2:54 remaining in the fourth quarter. A long drive could have ended the game, but getting even one first down could have seriously hurt Georgia, which had only two timeouts left. The Bearcats even got that first down on the second play of the drive, seemingly putting them in good position to see out the game.
However, Cincinnati suddenly lost all ability to manage time. As outlined by football analyst Warren Sharp, the Bearcats snapped the ball with 12 seconds left on the play clock despite a running game clock. In a similar situation on the next play, they snapped the ball with 10 seconds to go on the play clock. That’s 22 seconds’ worth of time that Cincinnati ultimately could have burned but didn’t.
Most egregiously, however, the Bearcats opted to throw a deep pass on 3rd-and-2 with 1:34 left despite Georgia being out of timeouts. Instead of taking roughly 30 more seconds off the game clock with a run play — potentially even getting a game-clinching first down — Cincinnati failed to convert on the pass and had to punt the ball back to the Bulldogs with 1:28 left. That was just enough time for Georgia to move the ball downfield for a dramatic field goal.
Had the Bearcats run the play clock down as far as they could and ran the ball on third down, even without converting, Georgia likely would’ve gotten the ball back with somewhere around 20-25 seconds to go in the game. That would have been a very difficult spot to get into field goal range from.
Cincinnati coach Luke Fickell was widely blamed on Twitter for the loss due to his inexplicable clock management, particularly the decision to pass on 3rd-and-short.
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