AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Missed kicks and makes. Big returns. Shaky nerves.
Special teams have produced some nerve-wracking, game-changing and game-clinching moments so far in the College Football Playoff.
The potential for more blink-of-an-eye touchdowns and knee-knocking pressure on late game field goals gets even bigger heading into the semifinals with Notre Dame-Penn State on Thursday night at the Orange Bowl and Ohio State-Texas on Friday night at the Cotton Bowl.
Notre Dame seems to have resolved its kicking struggles just at the right time.
Fighting Irish kicker Mitch Jeter, a graduate transfer from South Carolina, missed two games in the regular season with a hip injury and was just 8 of 15 on field goals heading into the quarterfinal against Georgia. Then he nailed kicks of 44, 48 yards, and 47 yards to become the first kicker in playoff history to make three from 40 yards or longer in a single game.
Texas' Bert Auburn could use a boost of confidence like that. His 66 career field goals is a record at a school that has produced future pro standouts Phil Dawson, Justin Tucker and Cameron Dicker. But he is just 16 of 25 this season, including a 6-of-14 mark beyond 40 yards.
In the quarterfinal win over Arizona State, he missed twice in the final 2 minutes of regulation. The first, from 48 yards, went wide right. Before he lined up 38 yards out with 3 seconds left, coach Steve Sarkisian tried giving him a pep talk. The ball doinked off the left upright. Texas prevailed in double overtime.
Auburn sent the SEC championship game into overtime with a tying kick in the final seconds. Teammates insist they believe he can deliver another big kick if needed.
“He’s made a lot of amazing kicks for us in the past. He’s going to come up big when we need him,” Texas defensive back Jahdae Barron said. “So, if he could just block out the noise. He knows we’re riding with him. We’ve got his back through it all. That’s what the culture is here.”
Texas and Notre Dame both scored on kick returns in the quarterfinals.
The Longhorns' Silas Bolden returned the first punt of the game 75 yards for a touchdown and a 14-3 lead against Arizona State. A senior transfer from Oregon State, the speedy Bolden hasn't delivered as much as hoped as a receiver, where he has 22 catches for 243 yards, but he finally broke off the big play in the return game.
It was a Notre Dame kickoff return against Georgia that swung the game for the Irish.
Jaydon Harrison's 98-yard return to open the second half stretched Notre Dame's lead to 20-3 and stunned the Bulldogs, who had been tied 3-all in the final minute before halftime.
A Jeter field goal and a Beaux Collins touchdown catch made it 13-3 before Harrison delivered. Fifteen seconds into the second half, Notre Dame led 20-3.
Notre Dame closed out the win with a little special teams trickery.
Notre Dame had a fourth-and-short deep in his own territory when coach Marcus Freeman sent the punt team out before running all 11 players off the field and sending in the offense.
Surprised, Georgia raced to match up and then jumped offside as the play clock ticked down. Notre Dame got the first down and kept the ball for another five minute, bleeding away the game clock.
“We practiced it to a point where I felt like we couldn’t get it wrong,” Freeman said. “I thought they did a great job of not panicking, which the whole point of that is trying to get some other panic.”
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Notre Dame's Jayden Harrison (2) returns a kickoff 98 yards for a touchdown during the second half against Georgia in the quarterfinals of a College Football Playoff, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
DEIR AL BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Overnight strikes by Israel killed at least 55 people across the Gaza Strip, hospital officials said Thursday, a day after senior government officials said Israel would seize large areas of Gaza and establish a new security corridor across the Palestinian territory.
Israel has vowed to escalate the nearly 18-month war with Hamas until the militant group returns dozens of remaining hostages, disarms and leaves the territory. Israel has imposed a month-long halt on all imports of food, fuel and humanitarian aid that has left civilians facing acute shortages as supplies dwindle.
Officials in Khan Younis, in the southern part of the strip, said the bodies of 14 people had been taken to Nasser Hospital – nine of them from the same family. The dead included five children and four women. The bodies of another 19 people, including five children aged between 1 and 7 years and a pregnant woman, were taken to the European hospital near Khan Younis, hospital officials said. In Gaza City, 21 bodies were taken to Ahli hospital, including those of seven children.
The Israeli military ordered the residents of several areas -- Shujaiya, Jadida, Turkomen and eastern Zeytoun -- to evacuate on Thursday, adding that the army “will work with extreme force in your area.” It said people should move to shelters west of Gaza City.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Israel was establishing a new security corridor across the Gaza Strip to pressure Hamas, suggesting it would cut off the southern city of Rafah, which Israel has ordered evacuated, from the rest of the Palestinian territory.
Netanyahu referred to the new axis as the Morag corridor, using the name of a Jewish settlement that once stood between Rafah and Khan Younis, suggesting it would run between the two southern cities. He said it would be “a second Philadelphi corridor ” referring to the Gaza side of the border with Egypt further south, which has been under Israeli control since last May.
Israel has reasserted control over the Netzarim corridor, also named for a former settlement, that cuts off the northern third of Gaza, including Gaza City, from the rest of the narrow coastal strip. Both of the existing corridors run from the Israeli border to the Mediterranean Sea.
“We are cutting up the strip, and we are increasing the pressure step by step, so that they will give us our hostages,” Netanyahu said.
The Western-backed Palestinian Authority, led by rivals of Hamas, expressed its “complete rejection” of the planned corridor. Its statement also called for Hamas to give up power in Gaza, where the militant group has faced rare protests recently.
Netanyahu’s announcement came after the defense minister, Israel Katz, said Israel would seize large areas of Gaza and add them to its so-called security zones, apparently referring to an existing buffer zone along Gaza’s entire perimeter. He called on Gaza residents to “expel Hamas and return all the hostages,” saying “this is the only way to end the war.”
Hamas has said it will only release the remaining 59 hostages — 24 of whom are believed to be alive — in exchange for the release of more Palestinian prisoners, a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli pullout. The group has rejected demands that it lay down its arms or leave the territory.
Netanyahu arrived in Hungary early Thursday on his second foreign trip since the world's top war crimes court issued an arrest warrant against him in November over Israel's war in Gaza.
Based in The Hague, Netherlands, the the International Criminal Court has said there was reason to believe Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant used “starvation as a method of warfare” by restricting humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, and intentionally targeted civilians in Israel’s campaign against Hamas — charges that Israeli officials deny.
ICC member countries, such as Hungary, are required to arrest suspects facing a warrant if they set foot on their soil, but the court has no way to enforce that and relies on states to comply. As Netanyahu arrived in Budapest, Hungary said it will begin the procedure of withdrawing from the ICC.
On Sunday, Netanyahu said Israel plans to maintain overall security control of Gaza after the war and implement U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to resettle much of its population elsewhere through what the Israeli leader referred to as “voluntary emigration.”
Palestinians have rejected the plan, viewing it as expulsion from their homeland after Israel’s offensive left much of it uninhabitable, and human rights experts say implementing the plan would likely violate international law.
The war began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 hostages, most of whom have since been released in ceasefire agreements and other deals. Israel rescued eight living hostages and has recovered dozens of bodies.
Israel’s offensive has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t say whether those killed are civilians or combatants. Israel says it has killed around 20,000 militants, without providing evidence.
The war has left vast areas of Gaza in ruins and at its height displaced around 90% of the population.
Separately, Israeli strikes killed at least nine people in southwestern Syria, Syrian state media reported Thursday.
SANA said the nine were civilians, without giving details. Britain-based war monitor The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said they were local gunmen from the Daraa province, frustrated with Israeli military encroachment and attacks in recent months.
Israel has seized parts of southwestern Syria and created a buffer-zone there, which it says is to secure Israel’s safety from armed groups. But critics say the military operation has created tensions in Syria and prevents any long-term stability and reconstruction for the war-torn country.
Israel also struck five cities in Syria late Wednesday, including over a dozen strikes near a strategic airbase in the city of Hama.
Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Relatives mourn the body of Ashraf Al Aqqad, who was killed in an Israeli army strike, before his burial at the hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Relatives of Ayad Jundia who was killed in an Israeli airstrike, grieve over his body at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians grieve over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, as they brought to the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians carry the bodies of those who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, as they brought to the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians grieve over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, as they brought to the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Relatives of Ayad Jundia who was killed in an Israeli airstrike, grieve over his body at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians pray over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians grieve over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, as they brought to the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Yamama Jundia, 13, injured in an Israeli airstrike, grieves alongside others over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in the same strike, at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians grieve over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in an Israeli airstrike, at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Inas Al Aqqad mourns the body of her husband Ashraf, who was killed in an Israeli army strike, before his burial at the hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Relatives mourn the body of Ashraf Al Aqqad, who was killed in an Israeli army strike, before his burial at the hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Mourners pray over the body of a woman killed in an Israeli army strike, before her burial at the hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Yamama Jundia, 13, injured in an Israeli airstrike, grieves alongside others over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed in the same strike, at the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City on Thursday, April 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians inspect a UN building after it was hit by an Israeli strike, in Jabaliya, northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday, April 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Palestinians inspect a UN building after it was hit by an Israeli strike, in Jabaliya, northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday, April 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
