For the Alabama Crimson Tide maybe a corner turned and a ramp to greatness
On Saturday night in a soggy Baton Rouge, the Alabama Crimson Tide delivered its best SEC road game win in many seasons. Identifying a better one probably requires going back to Oct. 3, 2015. Alabama went to Athens, GA to battle No. 8 ranked Georgia and dominated the Bulldogs in a 38-10 win.
How good is LSU? The Bengal Tigers are no longer a Playoff contender and though still ranked after three losses, LSU was perhaps always a Pretender. Alabama winning in Baton Rouge is one of the least shocking events across decades of college football. Alabama has won more games in Baton Rouge than LSU has won in the 89-game series.
The Crimson Tide has won six of its last seven games in Tiger Stadium.
Even with Saturday night’s beatdown and Alabama’s historical Baton Rouge success, LSU is a good enough team for the win to be significant. The LSU team Alabama pummeled beat Ole Miss less than a month ago.
More importantly, how good is the Alabama Crimson Tide? Every indication on Saturday night showed Alabama Football has turned a corner. Is that turned corner now a ramp to Championship success? If it is, should championship be defined in its plural form, adding a potential SEC Championship to a potential National Championship?
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Much work is left to do and while doing it, the Alabama Crimson Tide must continue to improve. Jalen Milroe was not the only rushing quarterback the Bengal Tigers have not been able to defend this season. He is the one having done by far the most damage to the LSU defense.
Milroe also started the LSU game sharp in the Tide’s passing attack. He finished with 109 passing yards and no interceptions. His 12-for-18 performance included only one passing play that gained more than 20 yards. He missed throws on some longer opportunities.
Even less than perfect, Jalen Milroe was sensational. Future teams will learn from LSU what not to do in trying to stop Milroe’s explosive runs. The knowledge may not allow future opponents to slow Milroe enough, as long as Alabama plays defense as it has done for the last two games, and Alabama does not beat itself with penalties.
Major Alabama Crimson Tide Improvement
The most impressive team stat from the LSU game was the Crimson Tide making third-down conversions on 10 of its 13 attempts. Considering Alabama went into the game as one of college football’s worst teams in that stat, Saturday night was a sensational turnaround. Going into the LSU game, Alabama was No. 10 among SEC teams in third-down conversions. Now the Alabama Crimson Tide is No. 6.
Is the Alabama Crimson Tide poised for a run to greatness? Asking that question as recently as three weeks ago would have been laughable. Now we know, that what appeared to be serious limitations might not be limitations at all.
