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College Football Playoffs: Covering the pomp, the circumstance and the drama

 
Jonathan Rivera, a 20-year-old from St. Petersburg, snags a football while wearing the jersey of his favorite Tampa Bay Buccaneers player, wide receiver Vincent Jackson, in the Buccaneers play area during the College Football Playoff Fan Central at the Tampa Convention Center on Friday, January 6, 2016. Thousands of fans gathered to play games, win prizes and buy College Football Playoff merchandise on the weekend before the National Championship in Tampa.
Jonathan Rivera, a 20-year-old from St. Petersburg, snags a football while wearing the jersey of his favorite Tampa Bay Buccaneers player, wide receiver Vincent Jackson, in the Buccaneers play area during the College Football Playoff Fan Central at the Tampa Convention Center on Friday, January 6, 2016. Thousands of fans gathered to play games, win prizes and buy College Football Playoff merchandise on the weekend before the National Championship in Tampa.
Published Jan. 10, 2017

We asked our college football crew to talk about some of their favorite moments from covering the playoffs this season.

TOM JONES

Hello, Lane. How ya doin'?

It's two days before the Peach Bowl and the national semifinal game between Alabama and Washington, and I'm talking with Lane Kiffin at the 5-yard line of the Georgia Dome.

There was a time when Kiffin was desperate for one job and, at this moment, he has two. He's the offensive coordinator at Alabama and the recently-named head coach of Florida Atlantic.

And, also at this very moment, he is telling me that he can handle both jobs and that 'Bama head coach Nick Saban has "been great" about the whole thing. Kiffin sounded so genuine. He talked about how much he enjoyed Alabama. How much he had learned from Saban. And, yeah, he even admitted it was fun because, after all, winning is fun.

He said going for another national title was a perfect way to end his coaching career at Alabama. All in all, it was an enlightening and enjoyable conversation. Kiffin didn't sound crazy at all.

Know what turned out to be so crazy? I ended up closer to the field Monday night than Kiffin.

MARTIN FENNELLY

It's Usher, man!

So I'm standing on the grass, stomping my feet in the cold, but it's a beautiful evening in Tampa Bay, where we know how to do big events. I'm in the middle of one, a College Football Playoff concert, and Usher has thousands under his spell. I had just found out that Usher was a man, not a band, as I walked to the event with my 16-year-old daughter, Norah.

But there we were. It didn't matter that I knew in the hour Usher was on stage I vaguely recognized two of the songs, and forgot them just as quickly. Or that the two young people dancing next to me occasionally looked at me as if I'd been trapped in ice for the last 10,000 years and urged me to get with the program.

It's Usher, man!

What I did know is that downtown Tampa was putting on a show, and as much as I sound like a goob homer, it all worked. It's why the College Football Playoff championship game will be back. And should be back.

Don't give me this stadium-size thing. Okay, the Cowboys Stadium and the Superdome seat more, and there are newer stadiums in that other bay area and soon to open in Atlanta.

We know how to do this. We have the people who know how to put things together, like Tampa Bay Sports Commission executive director Rob Higgins, like Tampa mayor Bob Buckhorn. More important, the people who run the CFP, like executive director Bill Hancock and CEO Michael Kelly, they like Tampa Bay.

The CFP wants this game back here. Trust me. This is about people and personal relations more than stadium size.

It's Usher, man!

GREG AUMAN

I have missed college football. That's not to say covering the NFL is better or worse at all, just different.

So getting to help out in covering a national championship game is a no-brainer, the kind of thing you volunteer shamelessly for. I covered championship games in 1995 and 1996 when I was in college, and again with the Times in 2006 and 2008, but I like that the playoff has taken this to another level.

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There's been a Super Bowl feel to Tampa this week, and not just the crazy ticket prices. Fans all over, ESPN broadcasting live, and cool events filling the days leading up to the game. It's always a cool thing to feel like you're at the center of the sports world, and that has been Tampa.

So whether you were pulling for Alabama or Clemson, this felt like a win here — Tampa knows how to throw a party around a sports event, and you feel like this will help get a Super Bowl back here next time they're announcing future sites. Short of that, I'll eagerly await another college football championship game. Glad to help out if they need it …

JOEY KNIGHT

Downtown bustle rarely has registered as a local attribute. Until recent years, we've mainly confined our revelry to other nooks of the community: Ybor, SoHo, beaches, or the Seminole Hard Rock/fairgrounds cluster.

But with the development of the Tampa Riverwalk, the city's nerve center has experienced a resuscitation.

After this long, festive College Football Playoff weekend, it can be surely be upgraded to out-and-out revival.

The waterside concerts, convention center activity, foot races and festivals converged with crisp weather to show the nation how invigorating downtown Tampa can be. With more development sprouting up along the river, its vitality will only grow.

City that never sleeps? We won't go that far, but an area once deemed only a business hub has re-entered the business of nightlife and entertainment.

MATT BAKER

Sure, the destination was great. But what about the journey to Monday night's game?

Clemson and Alabama started the season in the top two, so teams were gunning for them all season. Yet they endured.

Alabama did it with dominant defense and a true freshman quarterback who withstood challenges at Ole Miss and at LSU. Clemson did it by finding ways to win close games. The six-point win at Auburn to start the season. The two fourth-quarter comebacks at Florida State. The overtime scare against N.C. State.

Both teams also impressed in their conference title games and delivered semifinal blowouts that were memorable in their own rights — Clemson's sheer dominance of Urban Meyer's Buckeyes and Bo Scarbrough's explosion against Washington.

The road to Tampa had plenty of other contenders throughout the season — FSU, Michigan, Louisville and Houston, to name four. But when it ended Monday night, the two best, most deserving teams were the ones playing at Raymond James Stadium for a shot at the national title. Just as it should be.