f you were looking for starker examples of those crushing moments of fan disbelief, Saturday provided them. In college football, we have a name for those moments of utter incredulity —“Surrender Cobra”— and none was more indelible than what happened in the final seconds of No. 11 Tennessee’s 34-31 victory over No. 25 Georgia at Sanford Stadium.
After blowing a 17-point lead, the Bulldogs trailed 28-24 with 19 seconds to play. But freshman quarterback Jacob Eason fired a 47-yard touchdown to freshman Riley Ridley down the left sideline to put Georgia ahead 31-28 with 10 seconds left.
Almost immediately, several Tennessee fans locked their hands above their heads, which has become the universal sign of disbelief when a team makes a disastrous play or an opponent does something amazing.
What happened next resulted in a rare double “Surrender Cobra.”
Read it all and if you haven’t seen what happened, please do.
The biggest Surrender Cobra ever, the Big Game 1982 (Cal-Stanford). Four seconds to go, with Stanford 20, Cal 19. And then The Play:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfebpLfAt8g
The secret of the play? The Cal players also played together on the rugby team, so on receiving the ball in the last play of the game they decided to do a rugby maneuver and lateral the ball back among themselves. They hoped Stanford wouldn’t know how to defend against the lateral since it is rarely used in football any longer. Five laterals and then the touchdown. It worked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYhn2CGFQ9I