What Alabama’s ugly win over South Carolina means for the Tide

[92tide]

As far as ugly wins go, it was a thing of beauty.

that last 9 1/2 minutes was some absolutely dominating football

 

[Saban4Ever]

that last 9 1/2 minutes was some absolutely dominating football

Yep. When I rewatched the game, I only watched the 4th quarter. lol. Still was too stressful to watch the first 3 quarters even knowing what would happen.

 

[92tide]

Yep. When I rewatched the game, I only watched the 4th quarter. lol. Still was too stressful to watch the first 3 quarters even knowing what would happen.

i've watched the last 10 minutes a few times now. it's like a nice salve after the last several years.

 

[tusks_n_raider]

It is a good article and mentions the 5-game stretch, four in a row against ranked opponents. Strange, but he didn't mention the fact that 3 of the 5 were on the road. And it's tough to win on the road in the SEC.

I'd be curious as to how often this year that a road team not named Alabama won an SEC game. Anybody got any stats on that?

A few other random points:

-- Mbakwe was pure unlucky on that punt touch. Not only was his back to the ball, but he was pushed for 10 yards +/-. It should have been a penalty on USCe. Just another brick in the wall that SEC refs are horrible. But hey, Alabama gets all the calls.

-- I do love the grit and character this team has shown. And the fact that they seem to genuinely like each other. What a refreshing difference from the last 2-3 years!

-- Nine weeks into the season, I think the OL just is what it is. We're 126th out of 135 FCS teams in running success. So I'm not optimistic that the traditional downhill running game is fixable this year. I'm also more than a little concerned about Proctor's ability to even slow down OU's or the barn's rush -- and the domino effect that has to have on Simpson's nerves / psyche / jitters.

Yeah, you can scheme around it, but that necessarily involves giving up something you'd rather not do without. We have some time to develop the wrinkles, but they're band-aids, not fixes. And OU and the barn have time to develop counter-actions. The fact is Proctor isn't going to magically transform into Chris Samuels or Andre Smith or Cam Robinson over the course of 13 days.

6 Teams have won at least 2 SEC Road Games and have winning SEC Road Records.

USCe, UTK, AU, and MSU are getting beat up on in their own house.

Road Win Sites in Parenthesis.


Bama: 3-0 in SEC Road Games (UGA, Mizz, USCe)

Texas 8&4: 2-0 in SEC Road Games (Arky, LSU)

UGA: 2-0 in SEC Road Games (Tenn, AU)

OU: 1-0 in SEC Road Games (USCe) *0-1 in a Neutral Site vs TX*

OM: 2-1 in SEC Road Games (UTK, OU)

Texas: 2-1 in SEC Road Games (UTK, MSU)

Tenn: 2-1 in SEC Road Games (UTK, MSU)



Vandy: 1-1 in SEC Road Games (USCe)

Mizz: 1-1 in SEC Road Games (AU)

Fla: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

LSU: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

AU: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

USCe: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

MSU: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

Arky: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

UTK: 0-2 in SEC Road Games

 

[RammerJammer14]

It simply cannot be overlooked that we’d had the 4 game gauntlet, which ended with an emotional rivalry revenge game at home. Then you go on the road, against a really good team which due to circumstances is now playing for its postseason lives.

You can’t overstate how difficult those circumstances are. This is something neither Indiana nor Ohio State will ever face. Not saying it has anything at all to do with where either of those teams are ranked, nor how either team will fare in the playoff. Still any critique of Alabama’s performance against South Carolina has to take the above into account or it’s useless drivel.

(I mention the two Big Ten teams because I’ve seen a ton of angst from both over Alabama seemingly getting a free pass for struggling against Carolina)

I love how much we live rent free in their heads. No one talks in whispers about Ohio State or holds up “we want Ohio State” signs during a completely unrelated game or event. No Bama fan thinks about Ohio State or Indiana at all, unless they are next on the schedule or a loss by one of them would impact our playoff spot or chances.

 

[skrayper77]

We can already see a "gut check" game coming on the road at the barn.

I hope we learn some HUGE lessons from this game, because I could see that game following this script.

The truth is, if we could have centered ourselves during the 2nd or 3rd quarters, this game is probably won by multiple scores, but we couldn't.

The coaching staff and team's job is to figure that out. Arguably, AU's defense will be tougher so I hope we learned some tangible lessons to employ in late Nov.

I’m more concerned with Oklahoma than Auburn. Neither is great offensively, but Auburn is epically bad at it. OU has a great defense and enough offense to potentially pull off the upset.