The Tide have been anything but dead since. It’s a good D, but it’s hardly an elite one, and Alabama should be able to line up and blast away, just like it did against the Tigers.
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Following a huge victory over the LSU Tigers, the Alabama Crimson Tide are one of five college football teams on upset alert in Week 11.
” I think previous year was just a culmination of the season, all the struggles they’d gone through to try to get that SEC win and everything just built up to that day”, said Keith Jackson, the Little Rock native and color analyst on the Razorback Sports Network.
Fournette and the Tigers ran into a Tide defense – now ranked as the most efficient in the nation by numberFire – that played the role of both the unstoppable force and the immoveable object. LSU’s Leonard Fournette ran for 31 yards in a loss to Alabama. Snapping that streak and getting Oklahoma back to the top of the Big 12 would be a nice line on his Heisman resume.
But those figures barely illuminate Alabama’s dominant performance. Safeties were making tackles and they were making them very close to the line of scrimmage.
RD: First off, they give up a ton of yards and points in the second half.
Leading up to the Alabama-LSU game, I said the more impressive running back would have a chance to ascend up the Heisman rankings. “We put a lot of emphasis on tackling because we have got to swarm them”. Collins is a big reason for that resurgence with his third straight season of 1,000-plus rushing yards – including 108 yards in a 53-52 win over Ole Miss last week.
Backup Kenyan Drake did have a strong game against LSU with 68 yards.
Fournette spearheaded the attack. This time around, he comes into the game on a roll hitting 70% of his throws over the last three games with over 300 yards passing in each.
Until his visit to Tuscaloosa.
No. 20 Mississippi State (7-2, 3-2 Southeastern Conference; No. 17 CFP) hosts No. 3 Alabama (8-1, 5-1; No. 2 CFP) on Saturday in a game with Western Division implications for both teams. “We’ve just got to remember what got us to this point”.
LSU could have an extra bit of motivation heading into this weekend’s game against Arkansas.
Ross Dellenger of The Advocate turned up similar findings in his analysis. Fournette had just five carries for nine yards. But on his other 11 rushes – excluding 2 goal-line carries – Alabama had the same amount of defenders in the box as LSU had blockers. Alabama’s run defense is without question the best in all of college football, and many would argue it’s one of the best of all-time.
For the Crimson Tide, Mississippi State stands in the way of a second-straight playoff berth.
Other advanced metrics systems agree. Brandon Harris is completing 55.1 percent of his passes for 1,226 yards, 10 touchdowns and one interception.
Alabama is now second in the new College Football Playoff rankings and is the Vegas co-favorite, along with Ohio State, to win the national title.
“That was a prime showcase for the state of Arkansas and the Razorbacks and for Louisiana as well”, said former Arkansas standout Marvin Caston, a native of Winnsboro, La., who is now an associate director of the Razorback Foundation.
If Alabama does get by Mississippi State, it still has to play at hate rival Auburn on November 28.
It’s a ridiculous concept given that the award should be awarded to the nation’s best player for a full season, not just a very good player who had a spectacular game.
There are still plenty of chances for teams ahead of them to drop and have LSU move upwards with more wins.
Temple vs. No. 1 North Carolina (4 p.m., CBSSN (333)): The top-ranked Tar Heels will open their season at the Veterans Classic in Annapolis, Md., without star point guard Marcus Paige, who recently suffered a broken hand.
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Arkansas, expected to add previously injured reserve receiver Cody Hollister to its game-ready corps with two weeks of practice testing his early-season broken foot, wraps its week’s drills with a closed practice today.
