2011 BCS National Championship Game

Finishing No. 1 and No. 2 in the final BCS rankings, respectively, the Auburn Tigers from the Southeastern Conference faced the Oregon Ducks of the Pacific-10 Conference for the national championship. Both teams finished the regular season undefeated. The Coaches Poll, which partially factored into the BCS rankings, had Oregon No. 1 and Auburn No. 2, though Auburn's higher rankings in the Harris Interactive Poll and computer polls gave them the edge for No. 1 in the BCS. The Associated Press Poll (AP), which did not factor into the BCS rankings, had Auburn No. 1 and Oregon No. 2.

Auburn quarterback Cam Newton was the 2010 Heisman trophy winner.

Oregon running back LaMichael James entered the game as the Doak Walker Award winner.

Selected in an NFL Draft (number corresponds to draft round)

† = 2010 All-American

Prior to the game a moment of silence was held for the victims of the shooting in Tucson, Arizona, two days before the game in which U.S. Representative Gabby Giffords was shot in the head and six others, including Federal Judge John Roll, were killed.[9]

Despite the two teams having among the nations top offenses, neither team scored in the first quarter, with both teams punting on their opening drive. On Oregon's second drive Thomas threw an interception to Demond Washington. On the second play of the ensuing drive Newton threw an interception to Cliff Harris. On the following drive after moving the ball to the Auburn 27, Thomas threw his second interception, this time to safety Zac Etheridge. Auburn once again failed to capitalize on a Thomas interception and punted.

Early in the second quarter, Oregon scored the first points on a 26-yard field goal, to go up 3-0. Auburn then claimed the lead on an 82-yard drive, finishing with a Kodi Burns touchdown reception. Oregon responded quickly with a four-play drive, ending with a touchdown reception by LaMichael James and added a two-point conversion to make the score 11-7. The next drive, Auburn drove to the Oregon one yard line but turned the ball over on downs. Two plays later, however, Auburn tackled James in the endzone for a safety, making the score 11-9. On Auburn's final drive of the first half, Newton found Emory Blake for a 30-yard touchdown pass to make the score 16-11 at the half.

On the first drive of the 3rd quarter, Auburn kicker Wes Byrum kicked a 28-yard field goal to give Auburn a 19-11 lead.[10] Following a pair of punts by both teams, Oregon drove to the Auburn 1 yard line, but was stopped on the goal line and lost possession.

The teams traded possession several times in the 4th quarter, until Oregon recovered a fumble on the Auburn 40-yard line with 5:05 left. Oregon then drove down the field and scored a touchdown at the 2:33 minute mark. They added a two-point conversion to even the score, 19-19.[11]

On the game's final possession, Auburn drove 73 yards[12] to the Oregon 1-yard line. The drive included a run by Michael Dyer, in which he appeared to be tackled after 6-7 yards, but fell on top of defender Eddie Pleasant. Since neither his knees nor the ball touched the ground, the Auburn sideline urged Dyer to continue after getting back up, and the Oregon defense finally tackled him after a 37-yard gain. The play was reviewed and the ruling on the field was upheld. Dyer then rushed for a touchdown, but a subsequent review showed that Dyer's knee went down before crossing the goal line. The touchdown was reversed and the ball placed at the Oregon 1-yard line. From there, Auburn ran the clock down to 2 seconds, and Wes Byrum kicked a game-winning 19-yard field goal as time expired, giving Auburn the national championship.[13][14]

By winning the game, Auburn was crowned as the BCS National Champion. In addition, Auburn was ranked as the number one team by the Associated Press.[15]

• For the second time in BCS history, three No. 1 teams (Oklahoma, Auburn, and Oregon) were ranked in the first three standings of the year. In 1998, the first season of the BCS, UCLA debuted at No. 1, followed by Ohio State and Tennessee.
• Three teams from non-Automatic Qualify conference schools (TCU, Boise State, Utah) were ranked in the top-five at the same time after three weeks of BCS rankings. TCU ended the season as the No. 2 team and won the 2011 Rose Bowl game. TCU was picked by a postseason poll as having won a share of the national championship, due to their 13-0 perfect record and win over #4 ranked Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl.

• This was the first meeting between the two schools in football. Auburn had played one school from the state of Oregon (Oregon State at Birmingham in 1973) and Oregon had not previously played a team from the state of Alabama. Auburn had a 5–3 record against Pac-10 teams while Oregon was 4–4 against the SEC.[16][17]
• As the Pac-10 and SEC never had a common bowl game tie-in during the entirety of the BCS era, the only ways for two teams from those conferences to meet in the postseason would be either for a team from each conference to qualify for the BCS National Championship Game, with this particular game being the only time that that happened during those 16 years, or for a team from either or both conferences to receive an at-large bid to a BCS bowl, something that never occurred (in 2002, the Sugar Bowl wanted USC to play Georgia, but the Orange Bowl, which had higher priority that year in terms of picks due to having a higher payout, beat them out and in 2013 the Sugar Bowl was considering picking Oregon to play Alabama, but ultimately passed them over in favor of Oklahoma). The most recent bowl game which featured a Pac-10 team vs an SEC team was the 1989 Freedom Bowl when the Washington Huskies defeated the Florida Gators 34-7. The Pac-10 and SEC both expanded in subsequent years (with the Pac-10 being renamed the Pac-12) and teams from those two conferences met again in the 2016 Peach Bowl with the Alabama Crimson Tide facing the Washington Huskies in a semifinal game of the College Football Playoff which replaced the Bowl Championship Series after the 2013 season, the Pac-12 and SEC would also eventually get a bowl game tie-in in the form of the Las Vegas Bowl in 2020, albeit it also has a rotating tie-in with the Big Ten Conference.
• Two Auburn teams were undefeated in 1993 and 2004, but did not play for the national championship.
• Seven BCS Championship game records were broken or tied, including the longest pass play when Darron Thomas passed to Jeff Maehl for 81 yards, the most team passing yards (374, Oregon), and most 2-point conversions (2). The combined passing yardage of the two teams (639 yards) were also the most in the games. Auburn's 85 total plays were a new record, exceeding the record set at the January 4, 2006 game between Texas and USC with 82 plays.
• The game was played two days after the 2011 Tucson shooting, an attempted assassination attempt on Rep. Gabby Giffords of Arizona, that took the lives of several others, including a federal judge and a 9-year-old girl. A moment of silence was held in honor of those lost before the game. Tucson is in Pima County in Arizona, and the adjacent county is Maricopa County, where Glendale is located.
• Cam Newton's performance was somewhat limited due a back injury, evident at the game's conclusion when he was lying in pain waiting on the trophy presentation.[18]