CFB Blitz: Takeaways from Saturday's 1st-round games

College Football Blitz recaps the most important developments from Saturday's tripleheader of College Football Playoff games and examines their significance moving forward.

Locals deliver for Miami

If you want to win at Miami, you better own the South Florida region in high school recruiting, as it's been one of the main catalysts behind the success of "The U" across generations of college football. Mario Cristobal has done just that since taking over his alma mater, and the fruits of that labor showed in a big way during the program's first CFP win.

The Hurricanes' narrow 10-3 victory over Texas A&M was certainly a team effort, but three local kids stood out as central figures who delivered in the clutch.

The first comes as no surprise: Wide receiver Malachi Toney has been Miami's most dangerous offensive player since stepping on campus as a product of the famed American Heritage School. For a brief moment, though, Toney was on the other side of glory following a crucial fumble that gave the Aggies the ball near midfield in a 3-3 game. However, Texas A&M's offense quickly stalled - something we saw plenty of - and soon after, the 18-year-old redeemed himself with the go-ahead touchdown.

Toney largely had running back Mark Fletcher Jr. to thank for that chance at redemption. Toney's fellow American Heritage alumnus - three years his senior - ran all over the Aggies for a career-best 172 rushing yards. Fletcher's own clutch moment - a 56-yard scamper from the Hurricanes' 14-yard line - set up Toney for his eventual game-winning touchdown.

At long last, the offense had generated enough points to win. Then, one final stop by Miami's defense sent the Canes to the Cotton Bowl for a date with Ohio State. Freshman defensive back Bryce Fitzgerald - who went to Christopher Columbus High School, the same as Cristobal - did the honors, picking off Marcel Reed for the second time, this one a game-sealing interception in the end zone.

Add in three sacks and four tackles for loss from the outrageous Rueben Bain Jr. and it's clear that the 305's impact was massive in the victory over the Aggies.

Reed limits Texas A&M

As if losing on a potential game-tying touchdown being intercepted isn't reason enough to cause Texas A&M fans distress, when you scale back the Aggies' season a few weeks, even greater offensive concerns are revealed.

Chief among them is the play of Reed when the level of competition ramps up. He can light up a scoreboard at the best of times - just ask Notre Dame - but his play down the stretch simply wasn't good enough. The regular-season finale against Texas and CFP opener versus Miami represented the most talented defensive units the Aggies faced, and the returns were incredibly underwhelming.

Reed completed 45 of 71 passes for a total of 417 yards in those contests with zero touchdowns against four interceptions. That 5.8-yard average per throw would rank well outside the top 100 in the nation. Those struggles doomed the team's offense in its most critical moments, with the Aggies scoring seven total points across their last six quarters of football.

The book on Reed is to keep him in the pocket and force him to take shots down the field. So much of the success in A&M's passing game comes from KC Concepcion and Mario Craver working magic after the catch. Outside of a 59-yard completion to Craver, the Aggies' longest passing play Saturday was just 19 yards.

Getting Reed more comfortable against top-level competition has to be Texas A&M's No. 1 priority this offseason. The Aggies won't take the next step until he does - or they bring in someone else.

Train still runs without Lane

It took exactly three plays for Ole Miss to show that Lane Kiffin's absence wasn't going to be a crippling loss in the first round of the College Football Playoff. The Pete Golding era in Oxford began with a three-play, 75-yard drive that resulted in Kewan Lacy plunging into the end zone to give the Rebels a lead they would never relinquish against Tulane.

How Ole Miss would look without Kiffin was the question on everyone's minds heading into the playoff. The emphatic answer: the exact same.

The 41-10 blowout looked virtually identical to the Rebels' 45-10 win over the Green Wave in September. The American champion simply wasn't on the same level athletically. Those against Group of 5 representation in the CFP will certainly use this result as a talking point, and it's tough to argue after what we saw on the field.

It's unclear whether Kiffin was watching his former team in action, but he did post some extremely specific stats online during the contest.

Kiffin should be pleased with the Rebels' victory, considering LSU is paying him any contract bonuses that he would have received at Ole Miss. That means Saturday's win made him $250K richer.

Ole Miss booked another rematch with the win: a meeting with Georgia in the Sugar Bowl.

Cinderella hibernates until March

There's nothing more entertaining in college sports than a small program trying to make a Cinderella run and take down some of the blockbuster names in the sport. At least, in March that is.

Saturday served an emphatic reminder that football ain't basketball and Cinderella doesn't make an appearance until Christmas is long gone.

Thanks to the ineptitude of the ACC and it's outrageously silly tiebreaker setup, this year's College Football Playoff saw two different Group of 5 programs make the field. Some thought that meant two different chances for David to slay Goliath and shock the world. However, in reality, it simply handed Ole Miss and Oregon de facto byes to the quarterfinals.

The combined score by halftime in the final two games of the day was 51-9. At least Oregon made James Madison's death quick with five straight touchdown drives to open the contest at an absurd 16.6 yards per play.

Yes, upsets in March Madness are a core part of the sport, and one of the main things that drives attention to the tournament. However, the talent and size discrepancy between basketball programs is significantly different than what we see on the football field. If you combine the 11-man offensive and defensive units Saturday, it's not a huge stretch to suggest Oregon had the best 22 players in the final game of the day.

We aren't saying football will never produce a stunning result. Anybody who has watched long enough remembers Appalachian State over Michigan, Boise State over Oklahoma, or just last year when national runner-up Notre Dame lost at home to Northern Illinois. However, not one of those games came during a playoff for the national title. With extra time to prepare, any opponent is going to get the full attention of a giant like Oregon. Add the transfer portal stripping the majority of top players from the Group of 5 level, and it's borderline impossible to ever see one of these underdogs winning in the pressure cooker of the playoff.

Anti-trust regulations forced the inclusion of the Group of 5 in the playoff, so they will likely remain with a spot moving forward. However, the committee needs to ensure that's where it ends, regardless of what shenanigans the ACC pulls.