Alabama’s win over LSU comes with a concerning trend that could come back to haunt the Crimson Tide when it matters most
Alabama continues to look out of sorts in a critical area of football.
The Alabama Crimson Tide avoided a trap game against the LSU Tigers on Saturday night, winning and covering the spread (for those who care) by way of 20-9 at Bryant Denny.
Another win before what will likely be the biggest game remaining on Alabama’s calendar next week, the Crimson Tide kept it rolling, even with Ty Simpson having a few uncharacteristic misses and the offense largely being inefficient throughout the contest.
Why the latter? Because Alabama continues to struggle in one of the most fundamental areas of football, and hat could hurt them come CFP time.
Alabama continues to struggle running the football in win vs. LSU
Look, I don’t want to discredit Saturday night’s win. To beat an LSU team that was not only off a bye, but had new life with the interim coach bump was impressive. A defensive showing that caused the benching of LSU QB Garrett Nussmeier, who was a Heisman favorite at one point, was a big win for that unit.
But let’s get real here. LSU just fired its coach and has struggled all season. A couple of weeks after the Crimson Tide only went for 72 yards on the ground against South Carolina, Alabama came out of the bye even worse, totaling just 56 yards and 2.2 yards per carry, both of which were season lows.
“We only had 56 yards, so it needs to be better,” said Kalen DeBoer after the game via Alabama’s YouTube channel. “We certainly [can do] one or two things on each play: do a better job blocking, and then, you know, do a good job of being physical with the ball in our hands too. And you know, falling ahead for yards, those extra one or two yards, three yards that you can get by running through arm tackles and things like that.”
“You know, those can hurt. And so yeah, we got to do a better job giving lanes for the running back to go hit it confidently and hit it hard. It’s an effort across the board. You know, when we run the perimeter, let’s make sure we get the blocks out there. But yeah, we certainly got to be better than we were [tonight].”
The Oklahoma Sooners are on tap for Alabama in what is looking like the biggest game of the weekend. If Alabama can march forward with a victory, the team positions itself greatly for the last two weeks of the season.
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