https://www.al.com/alabamafootball/...-play-calling-dooms-tide-in-blowout-loss.html
It served as a reminder of how difficult it is to replace your offensive coordinator and defensive coordinator seemingly every year. Saban has been so good at replacing departing assistants it’s easy to assume there will never been a discernible drop off in coaching but the constant turnover caught up to him in Santa Clara.
There were curious play calls -- moving away from the run on Alabama’s first drive of the second quarter when Josh Jacobs was dominating was a head scratcher -- and an inability to keep the Tide’s offense in rhythm. Alabama’s disastrous fake field goal attempt that featured kicker Joseph Bulovas as the lead blocker won’t soon be forgotten but throwing the ball three consecutive times on Clemson’s 26-yard line -- after the Tide already had three runs of nine-yards or more on that drive -- wasn’t much better. Alabama racked up plenty of offensive yards against Clemson but it felt like Locksley, Tagovailoa and the rest of the offense forgot what worked all season once they entered the red zone. After falling behind Clemson, Alabama became desperately aggressive on offense which didn’t work.
Saban admitted after the game he was worried Clemson could capitalize on a depleted and overmatched Alabama secondary.
“(I) never really ever got comfortable with what we needed to do to win this game, especially on defense, especially the match-ups we had in our secondary versus their receivers,” Saban said. “That was something that was kind of bothering me going into the game, and as the game unfolded, it worked out that those match-ups were a big difference in the game.”