Alabama’s College Football Playoff legitimacy in question after blowout SEC title game loss
When the field for the 12-team College Football Playoff is revealed Sunday afternoon, Alabama will almost certainly be included. It seemed inevitable when the selection committee moved the Crimson Tide up one spot to No. 9 in its latest rankings, overtaking a Notre Dame team that closed the regular season with a much more convincing rivalry victory.
It probably doesn’t matter that Alabama doesn’t look like it belongs on the same field as No. 3 Georgia in the SEC championship game. The Bulldogs got a rare breakthrough over their growing rival, earning a 28-7 victory that was even more lopsided than the final score suggested.
Alabama rushed for minus-3 yards as a team and didn’t eclipse 100 total yards until late in the third quarter. Although the Tide beat Georgia in the regular season, they only scored seven points in their final six quarters against the Bulldogs.
It’s almost impossible to imagine a scenario in which Alabama doesn’t make the playoffs, but it’s fair to wonder if the Tide actually deserves the honor.
“They’re not (a playoff team),” said Damien Harris, the CBS College Football analyst who was a two-time national champion at Alabama. “This Alabama team, especially the offense, didn’t look like playoff caliber.”
Alabama would become the first team at large to three losses in the playoffs and the first team at large to have two double-digit losses in the same season. Alabama would be placed ahead of several deserving two-loss programs, including No. 11 BYU — which went 11-1 in the regular season and lost in the Big 12 championship game on Saturday — and No. 12 Miami.
While teams like Notre Dame, Miami and — before the playoffs began — BYU have been playing their best football since the committee began releasing weekly rankings, Alabama is trending in the opposite direction. The Tide are 2-2 against FBS opponents since Nov. 1, averaging 17 points per game and topping 21 points just once.
They are also 0-2 against currently ranked opponents since October 4 and have rarely looked convincing, even in victory. An 11-point win over a rudderless LSU team and a narrow seven-point escape against an Auburn team that finished with an SEC win hardly moves the needle.
Alabama also suffered the worst loss of any bubble team. The Tide was one of three Power Four teams defeated by Florida State this season. Their only positive is that the 14-point loss came in the first game; if this had happened in November, Alabama would be completely out of the discussion.
The collapse of the offense is the main culprit. Kalen DeBoer’s group can’t run the ball consistently without Jam Miller, and even with him, the ground attack is unreliable. Alabama ranks 13th in the SEC with 126.2 yards per game.
Quarterback Ty Simpson shares some of the blame. He once looked like a legitimate Heisman contender, but he’s been largely ineffective over the past month. He threw his fourth interception in as many games in the SEC title loss to Georgia and failed to complete 50 percent of his passes. Simpson is averaging 160.3 passing yards over Alabama’s last three games. He’s not solely responsible for Alabama’s position on the bubble, but the Tide offense as a whole looks unremarkable against comparable competition.
It’s unclear which direction the selection committee will go, although its recent decisions strongly suggest Alabama won’t contend. But the Tide are far from the undeniable juggernaut many thought they were earlier in the season.
