Rapid Reaction: Texas A&M uses late rally to run past North Carolina in Orange Bowl
North Carolina didn’t make it easy, but as it had all season, Texas A&M found a way to pull it out.
The Aggies were expected to win this Orange Bowl after several Tar Heel stars opted out. UNC surprised by staying in the game and even had a lead in the fourth quarter. But then A&M found a way, going ahead for good on Devon Achane’s 76-yard touchdown run in the final minutes.
Achane added the final dagger, too, adding another big run to set up his short TD run as the Aggies capped a 9-1 season with a 41-27 victory.
Earlier, Ainias Smith juked a couple of defenders for a big play that set up a touchdown run from Kellen Mond later on to tie the score at 27. The defense then forced a 3-and-out on the ensuing drive that set up Achane’s big runs. Achane finished with a career-high 140 yards and 2 TDs.
The Aggies outscored UNC 24-7 in the 4th quarter.
It was a back-and-forth battle all game with somewhat of a slow start. The score was just 7-3 in favor of A&M after the first quarter. Isaiah Spiller scored a touchdown when the Aggies decided to go for it on fourth down.
The Aggie offense ran into a bit of trouble against UNC. They were forced into a few 3-and-outs, especially early on in the game.
Spiller scored the second touchdown of the game for A&M, but was unable to get as much going against the Tar Heel front overall. He exited the fourth with an injury late. It was instead Ainias Smith who stole the show, finishing with 126 yards receiving.
The Tar Heels hurt A&M with the deep ball in this game.
Sam Howell hit Josh Downs for a 75-yard touchdown early in the fourth quarter that gave UNC a 27-20 lead. Earlier he found Dazz Newsome for a 28-yard score.
Mond passed for 232 yards and rushed for 36 more in what is expected to be the final game of his college career. Texas A&M ended its season at 9-1, while the Tar Heels fell to 8-4.
Looks like everyone that was supposed to win got the job done this week except for Darth Mullet. Good W aggies.
Don’t forget AU. Or have they joined the AAC?
I never thought auburn would win their game. It was bad enough with the missing players but they were also missing their HC.
That should have been a positive. Though AU hung tough for a while, then just did not have any left.
Great win Aggies, now for one more conference win on 1/11.
The Aggies should be #3 in the final poll.
“Darth Mullet.”
ahole coach, ahole team, pretty simple.
Hey, don’t forget the Miss St Muggers and their senile leader.
Good gracious! You act as though LSU has never had a fight at a game! Tulsa was the team with 4 unsportsmanlike penalties and a 100 % targeting by Tulsa that wasn’t called. When a lineman is laying face down on the ground 15 yds behind the play and a lineman hits you helmet to helmet trying to hurt you it’s targeting.
You’re a mizzou fan. You will never understand Georgia-Florida so don’t try. Like I said, “Darth Mullet”. Your team opted out so worry about that instead. Imagine putting all the time and effort into playing through the season and deciding you’re not going to play the last game. Another dumb comment from a mizzou fan.
Congrats on a great year Aggies. The SEC only lost 2 bowls and many of our games were teams with losing records against teams with winning records and some were ranked.
Yep. Some of them are always ridiculously weighted against the SEC. IIRC Ole Miss was in the 50s facing a top 10 team, and Mississippi State was in the 90s against their ranked competition.
SEC bias is real for a reason.
That was a good game for the end of Mond’s A&M career.
Any Win is a good game. Especially for your last one.
Agreed. They haven’t been pretty by any means, but a win’s a win. 7 straight double digit wins is pretty nice too!
Am I right that Mond has agreed to play in the Senior Bowl? I know in doing so means you’re declaring for the NFL draft.
Great game Aggies! Way to represent the SEC and go out in style.
He has, but I haven’t heard if that affects his eligibility.
Regardless, I hope he moves on. I think we saw the peak of what he can offer, and it’s good but not enough to beat Alabama.
Playing ugly got them at least a no. 3 finish. Congratulations Aggies
You mean he’s not coming back for what seems like his NINTH season? He had a good game even with getting beat up most of the game. I’m not sure if he’s nfl material, but someone should definitely give him a shot – he’ll work his butt off for them!
Well you certainly live up to your name BatteredSyndrome. I wouldn’t mind Mond coming back. It’s amazing how good a qb can play when he actually has a line that can block. Hopefully most decide to run it
Back next season.
As for Mond and the Senior Bowl, i think that it being the year of the covid, everyone can come back next season regardless.
Carolina is a good team. Decent win for the Aggies.
This isn’t being said enough. It was a great game for the Aggies but UNC deserves some accolades for their performance. Those guys really play hard for Mack and he’s building something good there in North Carolina.
Nice win, Aggies. Fun game to watch from start to finish.
good W for the Aggies. Great year for y’all. Usually cheer for the Heels (they are the local team) but the ACC going winless in bowl season is nice. Carolina’s pretty good, and Howell and the weapons they have offensively will continue to grow in the ACC. But Jimbo’s boys won and they deserved it in the end. SEC is now 6-2 in bowl season with the chip to go, and will have played and won the most bowl games when all is said and done.
Good win for A&M. They will improve to 4th in the final CFP rankings, ahead of Clemson, which finish no higher than 11th…
Yes, they should. Aggie clearly should have been the #4 team in the playoffs.
The Aggies should be #3 after both CU and ND got blown out in their games.
Many be thanks to our brothers in the SEC. It’s been a good year, now the national championship needs to stay home in the SEC.
Nice job Gators lmao. Everyone else got the job done. And every SEC team besides Tennessee is heading in a positive direction. I’d bet on Tennessee finishing 12th-14th in the SEC next year.
The opt outs and injuries really killed the Gators more than any other team. Kyle Trask was screwed when he lost hi top 4 receivers.
While true, it shows their lack of depth which is not a good reflection on their recruiting. UNC lost even more players and those backups stepped up and had a great game. In my opinion UNC>Florida at this point without a doubt.
A&M did a great job. Shouldve been a playoff team. Isaiah Spiller will be the best back in the SEC next year.
Good win for the Aggies. As an Auburn fan, history dictates that I can’t like Jimbo, but the program definitely seems to be on the uptick, so that’s good for the SEC.
Good game a&m!
As an die hard Aggie who started paying attention to college football during the Fran days, I’ve never been happier. The 2012 season was special, but it almost didn’t seem real. This feels like the next step forward, not the end. Very happy to watch our future seasons!
Agreed. This time TAM has staying power. If they can take advantage of Longhorn dysfunction in recruiting , they can become a regular Top 10 team that is always in natty conversation
Congrats to the Aggies. Very good win to cap a very good season.
And with that win tonight, the ACC finished 0-6 in bowl games.
And got two teams in the playoffs. Odd.
8 game Big 10 season vs full ACC season.
Discuss.
Whoops, 6 game B1G. Sorry.
Point still stands.
The style of the games we’ve played all seem to be one or another: dominate early or keep it close while pounding the opponent defense and pull away in the last 10 minutes of the game. The latter seems to be the case for the games after Covid hit our team.
Congratulations on the win Aggies!
Congratulations to the Aggies for a great year.
Good job Aggies. The ACC has been exposed for exactly what they are.
Great win A&M!
Weird how the ACC fans have disappeared from the site after these games. Almost as if they couldn’t bear to take another L after all the ones their teams received on the field.
It’s funny, right? What happened to Pinebarrens? I haven’t heard from a Clempson fan for a couple of days…
Good win and good season for TAMU..
Achane’s run was freaking awesome.
For a true freshman he really shows up in crunch time week after week. He’s going to be something special.