College Football’s Week 14:
DG’s “Pick Six” Taps #3 Texas (10-1) at #20 Texas A&M (8-3),
#15 South Carolina-#12 Clemson, Crucial ACC Tilts, Much More
By David Glenn
North Carolina Sports Network
Each week during college football season, we offer a “Pick Six” package of intriguing matchups — three “local” games that include one or more North Carolina-based team and three “national” contests that involve the Atlantic Coast Conference and/or the most prominent intersectional games.
Week 14: Top “National” Games
Game One
#15 South Carolina (8-3) at #12 Clemson (9-2), Sat., noon (ESPN)
Latest Betting Line: Tigers a three-point favorite
This Palmetto State rivalry started way back in 1896, but the longest winning streak — for either side — in this last century-plus was the seven straight victories posted very recently by coach Dabo Swinney and the Tigers.
From 2014-21, Clemson not only won all seven contests in that stretch, the Tigers absolutely annihilated the Gamecocks most of the time, by scores such as 56-7, 38-3 or — in 2021, on South Carolina’s home field — 30-0. The Gamecocks did win two years ago, 31-30 in Death Valley, but the Tigers have taken eight of the last nine in the rivalry, including by a 16-7 margin last year in Columbia.
This year, both teams are on the edges of the College Football Playoff conversation, with the Tigers needing a Miami loss to Syracuse on Saturday to get into the ACC championship game against SMU. Meanwhile, both the Tigers and the Gamecocks are hoping a win in their head-to-head matchup earlier on Saturday afternoon propels them into the conversation for an at-large bid to the playoff.
South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer (yes, son of Frank) is now in his fourth season as the head coach of the Gamecocks, and it looks as if he has the best team of his tenure there. The Gamecocks are 8-3, they’re nationally ranked, they have some NFL-caliber talent on defense, and earlier this month they posted back-to-back-to-back victories over Texas A&M, Vanderbilt and Missouri teams that were all nationally ranked at the time.
South Carolina’s only losses this season have been to LSU, Ole Miss and Alabama, all of which were high in the national rankings at the time and two of which are still in the national rankings.
The Gamecocks have been one of the best defensive teams in the country this season, led by edge rusher Kyle Kennard. Clemson, meanwhile, joins SMU as the only ACC teams that have played consistently well this season on both offense and defense, with running back Phil Mafah, wide receiver Antonio Williams, defensive end TJ Parker, linebacker Barrett Carter and cornerback Avieon Terrell leading the way.
One of the keys to the game will be how Clemson protects its junior quarterback, Cade Klubnik, who has been mostly good this season — he’s closing in on 3,000 passing yards, and he has 29 touchdown passes against only four interceptions — but whose worst game of the season came in the Tigers’ season opener, when Georgia’s defense absolutely dominated the line of scrimmage and turned Klubnik’s day into an absolute nightmare in that 34-3 Bulldogs victory.
Game Two
#6 Miami (10-1) at Syracuse (8-3), Sat., 3:30 pm (ESPN)
Latest Betting Line: Hurricanes an 11-point favorite
Miami is the heavy favorite here, and the Hurricanes’ offense — led by quarterback Cam Ward, the frontrunner for ACC Player of the Year and a legitimate Heisman Trophy candidate — has been absolutely fantastic.
However, this game is intriguing mainly for one simple, undeniable reason. Under third-year coach Mario Cristobal, the Canes have been vulnerable on defense all season, and Syracuse has one of the most prolific passing games in the entire country.
Ward has received most of the ACC quarterback headlines this fall, and understandably so, but he has overshadowed the similarly huge numbers of Syracuse QB Kyle McCord. An Ohio State transfer who won 11 of his 12 starts for the Buckeyes, McCord obviously has brought both his swagger and his winning ways to upstate New York; he actually leads the ACC with 359 passing yards per game, and his 26 touchdown passes are behind only Ward’s 34 and Klubnik’s 29.
Under first-year head coach Fran Brown, who like Duke’s Manny Diaz has quietly put up a very impressive debut campaign, Syracuse does not have a great defense this year, so if Miami just keeps putting up touchdowns, that’ll be all she wrote. On the other hand, if the Orange defense can somehow create some turnovers and/or force the Hurricanes into field goal attempts, there could be a thriller under the dome.
Remember, Miami ended up in very close, high-scoring, single-possession games against Virginia Tech, Cal and Louisville, mainly because the Hurricanes’ defense gave up a lot of long drives and a lot of big plays.
McCord has all sorts of quality weapons, with LeQuint Allen at running back, Orande Gadsden II at tight end, and Jackson Meeks and Trebor Pena at wide receiver. All of those guys are legitimate All-ACC candidates, so Miami will have its hands full defensively.
With a win, the Canes will punch their ticket to the ACC title game, but regardless of who wins, that national TV audience on ESPN probably will be treated to an offensive fireworks display late Saturday afternoon.
Game Three
#3 Texas (10-1) at #20 Texas A&M (8-3), Sat., 7:30 pm (ABC/ESPN+)
Latest Betting Line: Longhorns a six-point favorite
This is one of those traditional rivalries that took an extended break because of conference realignment, and now that the two programs are finally getting back together, they’re doing it in style. The Texas-Texas A&M winner on Saturday night will face Georgia next weekend in the SEC title game.
The Longhorns and the Aggies played each other almost every year from 1898-2011, with Texas winning almost two-thirds of the time. Then, 13 years ago, after the schools had been members of the same conferences for more than a century, A&M left the Big 12 for the SEC, and the programs haven’t played each other even once since … until now, after the Longhorns jumped to the SEC this summer, so now they’re members of the same league again.
Immediately before the 13-year hiatus, Texas had won 12 of the last 17 head-to-head matchups against A&M, including five of the last six games played at the Aggies’ 100,000-plus-capacity Kyle Field, which is the host venue again this year.
This will be the first game in this rivalry for both fourth-year Texas coach Steve Sarkisian and first-year Texas A&M coach Mike Elko, who did a very good job at Duke these past two seasons before signing a six-year, $42-million contract to take over the Aggies’ program.
Sarkisian has the Longhorns playing their best football since the peak of the Mack Brown era in Austin, when the Longhorns went — wait for it — 101-16, including the 2005 national championship and seven top-10 finishes in the national polls, in the nine-year stretch from 2001-09. Sarkisian led the Longhorns to a 12-2 record and the four-team College Football Playoff last season, and he’s in great position to get them into the 12-team version this year.
Elko also still has a shot at the playoff this year, and he’s a big-time coach who, in time, may prove to be a major upgrade from Jimbo Fisher in College Station.
Texas appears to have the slightly better team again this year, although to this point the Longhorns’ best wins are over 6-5 Michigan, 6-5 Vanderbilt, 6-5 Oklahoma and 6-5 Arkansas, so it will be interesting to see how they perform against well-coached and 8-3 A&M, especially in front of that legendary crowd in College Station.
With a victory, Texas would get a rematch against Georgia, the only team that has beaten the Longhorns so far this year, in the SEC championship game. A&M and Georgia didn’t meet in the regular season.
NOTE: For the complete Week 14 schedule (including television/streaming options) for all ACC and state of North Carolina teams, please click HERE.
