MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — There were moments this season when Mitch Jeter simply could not make a kick, as injuries to his hip and groin ruined his form and threatened to sink his confidence.
But over the past month, as he got healthy, he turned into “Mr. January.” As a result, Notre Dame is headed to its first national championship game since 2013, with an opportunity to win its first title since 1988.
The Irish say they have built their season on resilience — and it is possible nobody on the team embodies that more than Jeter. As he lined up for a 41-yard field goal attempt with the score tied at 24 and 12 seconds left on the clock against Penn State on Thursday night, all he could think was: “Let’s go make it.”
Jeter pushed the football through the uprights to give Notre Dame a 27-24 win over Penn State in the College Football Playoff semifinal at the Capital One Orange Bowl. In doing so, he became the first kicker to make a go-ahead field goal in the fourth quarter of a playoff game.
“Coach [Marcus] Freeman talks a lot about delayed gratification,” Jeter said. “He’s been talking like that all the way back to Week 2, when the [loss to Northern Illinois] happened. So it’s kind of been my mindset, going through an injury, having delayed gratification now to be able to come out and give our team a chance to go win a national championship.”
In addition, Freeman is the first Black head coach to have a chance to win a college football national championship.
Jeter was not the only player who stepped up big Thursday night. Many of those clutch performances came from unexpected players. Cornerback Christian Gray came up with a huge play to set up the game-winning field goal, when he intercepted Penn State quarterback Drew Allar with 30 seconds left.
Defensive coordinator Al Golden called the play by the sophomore “amazing” because he recognized what Allar was doing and beat his receiver to the ball.
“Christian got a great break on it,” Golden said. “And generally speaking, that kid works really hard on his hands, so if he has an opportunity to catch it, he usually does.”
Added Freeman: “In that moment, Christian had to make a play and he did, and was a huge reason why we won that game.”
A game that was an offensive slog for the first three quarters turned into a back-and-forth contest in the fourth, as the teams combined to score four touchdowns in less than 10 minutes.
Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love, playing with a knee brace and at less than 100%, got the scoring going in the final quarter with a remarkable second effort from the 2-yard line, when he jumped through one tackle, stayed on his feet, then dragged a defender with him into the end zone as his legs refused to stop moving to give the Irish a 17-10 lead.
Love usually celebrates his touchdowns by making a heart shape with his hands. But he forgot in the heat of the moment.
“I don’t know what I was on that play, but I felt like some extra strength,” Love said. “I just wanted to scream and rage. I just felt like the Hulk or something. I wasn’t even thinking about throwing up the heart. It was just expressing the dominance I just asserted over them.”
Penn State answered with two touchdown drives to take a 24-17 lead with 7:55 remaining. That is when Irish sophomore receiver Jaden Greathouse took his turn in the spotlight. On second-and-8 from the 46-yard line with 4:38 to go, Riley Leonard stepped back to throw. Greathouse made a move on Cam Miller, who fell down — leaving Greathouse wide open in the middle of the field.
Leonard lofted the ball and Greathouse caught it. He had a safety to beat, and one juke move later, Greathouse was in the end zone for a 54-yard touchdown pass to tie the score at 24.
“While I was out there, I really got a flashback to my 7-on-7 days in high school, and it was a similar play,” Greathouse said. “And I was like, ‘I just need to cut inside and I’ll be in the end zone celebrating.'”
Greathouse finished with seven catches for 105 yards and a score — the first 100-yard game of his career. Greathouse missed two days of practice earlier in the week because he was sick, but he said he woke up Thursday and believed, “Tonight is going to be my first 100-yard game.”
That brought things back to Jeter and his opportunity to break a tie at 24. His injury saga goes back to Week 4, when he took a hit to a hip on an errant field goal snap against Miami (Ohio). He played through it, but a few weeks later against Stanford, he injured his groin. As time went on, his bones were not in completely perfect alignment — and that affected his form.
Jeter missed four of his five field goal attempts in the final four games of the regular season. His dad, Andrew, works as a chiropractor and offered to help get his body back into alignment. He would come up on Thursdays and then stay for several days to help Jeter get his body aligned so everything could heal properly.
“Bones were in places that they shouldn’t have been,” Jeter said. “That was my femur, my back, my hips. He was able to move those bones back into position where they’re supposed to be, which allowed the healing process to almost accelerate.”
Once the playoffs started, Jeter felt 100%. It has shown in his performance, as Jeter has gone 7-of-8 in three playoff games — including several clutch kicks in the quarterfinal win against Georgia, too.
Quarterback Steve Angeli — another player who stepped up big, leading a field goal drive late in the first half with Leonard out of the game — said the team has nicknamed Jeter “Mr. January.”
“He is a confident guy, man,” Freeman said. “There is no moment too big for Mitch Jeter. I had a lot of confidence in him in that moment that he was going to do exactly what he did, and he did a great job at doing that.”
