27 days apart, backup quarterbacks won the National Championship and Super Bowl

In less than a month, we saw two backup quarterbacks win the highest of titles for their teams. Alabama defeated Georgia 26-23 on Jan. 8 in Atlanta to give the Tide the national championship thanks to true freshman quarterback Tua Tagovailoa’s second-half performance. Then just 27 days later, backup quarterback Nick Foles led the Philadelphia Eagles to a Super Bowl victory over the New England Patriots.

Down 13-0 at halftime, Bama head coach Nick Saban put in Tagovailoa over first-half starter Jalen Hurts. At the time, this was considered a very risky situation, given that it was a national title game and Tagovailoa had played quite sparingly compared to Hurts’ 26-2 record as Alabama’s starter.

Saban’s decision paid off, as Tagovailoa threw for 166 yards and three touchdowns, including the game-winning pass in overtime to seal the victory.

During and after the game, both Hurts and Tagovailoa were mutually supportive of each other, which was encouraging to see. It wouldn’t be out of the question for Hurts to transfer somewhere else, but for now, it looks like he’s at least staying positive as he enters into the offseason.

“Well, I don’t know that you can balance,” Saban said of having the two quarterbacks. “I think you do show your appreciation for it. I mean, one of the first things that I said to Jalen was ‘we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you. You put us in a position by the plays that you made and the way you played all year long, but it just seems to me like, if we’re going to have the best chance to win this game, that we may need to do it in a different way.’ I think he understood that. Sure, he didn’t -- any competitor would not accept that willingly, but as a team player, he was very supportive of Tua in the second half. I think he helped him in every way. I think Tua’s done that for him all year long.”

Most people wrote off Philadelphia as soon as Wentz was injured in Week 14, having to go through New York, Oakland, and Dallas before the NFC Playoffs. Foles led the Eagles to a 2-1 mark to close out the regular season, and beat Atlanta and Minnesota in the playoffs to advance to the Super Bowl. On Sunday night he threw for 373 yards and three touchdowns, and even got a touchdown reception on this nifty trick play at the end of the first half.

Foles was named the Super Bowl MVP after his incredible performance. Wentz was visibly emotional after the game, understandably:

“Yeah, I’m so happy for Nick,” Eagles head coach Doug Pederson said after the game. “A lot of people — a lot like this football team — a lot of people counted him out and didn’t think he could get it done. I believed in him, the staff believed in him, the players believed in him. We just needed time, we needed time together to work out some things, and this whole postseason Nick has shown exactly who he is and what he can do and what he is capable of doing. He’s well deserved of the honor, but I know that he would give credit where credit is due, and he had a lot of playmakers tonight make plays for him on both sides of the ball.”

“The past three weeks, he’s been paying out of his mind,” Eagles tight end Zach Ertz said postgame. “People panicked when Carson (Wentz) went down. Nick, we had all the confidence in the world in him. He’s a fantastic human, fantastic player.”

As for Foles’ future in Philadelphia, it’s not exactly certain he’ll be sticking around. Wentz is the real QB No. 1 for the Eagles, and Philly could easily give Foles to a team who really needs a quarterback. That’s not to discredit what Foles did for Philly, but Wentz had an MVP-caliber season before he went down.

We’ll see how it all shakes out for both Foles and Tagovailoa. For the time being, they’ll certainly be enjoying their times in the spotlight.