Let’s be honest here: There aren’t many stretches of dominance in the entire history of college football as a sport that can compare to what Alabama’s done in the early 2010s.
We’re talking about a team that when they’re clicking is nigh invincible and when they slip up is still extremely tough. They play like the big bad guy in storybooks, the unstoppable wave of humanity that threatens to overrun the kingdom.
It doesn’t have to be Jalen Hurts (Channelview) who beats Clemson.
It’s really easy to distill games of this caliber down to a war between quarterbacks, and while the jury is still out on Hurts’s legacy, Deshaun Watson is easily the better quarterback right now. Fortunately for Alabama, nothing about the quarterback matchup matters. Jalen Hurts can hand off to a stable of capable running backs or throw to a bevy of wideout talent. It seems like we all just forgot that during last year’s championship game Alabama’s secret weapon was O.J. Howard, a freaking four star tight end who had barely caught anything in the regular season.
This is why it’s easy to win if you’re Alabama. You have so many routes to take to victory that it’s impossible to shut them all down.
Defense wins championships.
#1 in total defense. 11 defensive touchdowns. #1 rushing defense. This is a casual year for Alabama. When you drop back to pass, they can do this.
By nearly every conceivable metric as well as the oft-derided eye test, Alabama’s defense is the best in college football. Have they played the best offenses? No, of course not, they play in the SEC. That doesn’t take away from this year’s unique dominance though.
Clemson’s power is derived from its run game. Alabama’s defensive front was fairly adept last year, but the Tigers were able to find creases. The difference from this year and last year is that Alabama’s rush defense has objectively become better while Clemson’s rushing offense has stayed the same.
For all of Deshaun Watson’s positives, he has a tendency to turn the ball over.
You absolutely cannot turn the ball over against this Alabama team and expect to win. It’s not just a matter of giving them good field position, they’re likely just going to score and get your offense back out there.
Watson is aggressive, and when he messes up, he messes up big. This high risk/high reward style of play works wonders against other teams, but it’s probably going to hit a brick wall tonight.
Last year, nearly the exact same Clemson team played a near-perfect game against a more flawed Alabama team, and it wasn’t good enough to win.
This one is the biggest one. Alabama has improved on last year’s championship season. Barring a meltdown of epic proportions, they’ll be better than the team Clemson faced last year, a team that Clemson couldn’t beat last year.
Teams differ from year to year. 2015 is not 2016. However, I can’t help but feel if someone was going to beat this Alabama team, it would’ve been last year’s Clemson team. An Alabama national title has seemed all but inevitable this season, and Clemson has some serious chinks in its armor that Nick Saban is excellent at exploiting. I think this one’s close, but in the end, the Tide will role, and the Dark Lord of the college football landscape will continue his rule.
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