“I feel pretty confident,” Alabama’s quarterback Jalen Milroe made his mindset clear before the big rivalry, as Crimson Tide is preparing for the big game of the season against Tennessee. Last Saturday, they registered a narrow victory against South Carolina with 27-25. However, their performance was not praiseworthy. And guess what, head coach Kalen DeBoer was once exposed to great scrutiny from analysts and experts.

During the fourth week, Tide played the most anticipated game of the season and won against Kirby Smart’s Bulldogs. DoBoer managed to silence the doubters, but it was short-lived as the following week, they lost to the non-ranked team, Vanderbilt. Considering their current status, Joel Klatt, an American college football color commentator, believes that they might lose against Tennessee. Additionally, DeBoer and his team stand at No. 4 on his list.

After they won against Georgia, Klatt made a similar statement and mentioned the Georgia Bulldogs are a “better” team even though they lost their biggest faceoff. This time he has questioned Alabama’s offense: “Alabama, as long as they beat Texas A&M, they would likely only have one SEC loss, which would put them in the SEC championship game. Number four because of the scenario I just said last week about Alabama, this offense is clearly explosive. You guys know that. But everything that I said last week about Alabama is coming to fruition. This is a team that, as the offense goes, they go, if their offense struggles, they’ll be in a dogfight.”

Alabama’s offensive line particularly struggled in the first half on Saturday, largely due to the lack of containing Kennard, who was the leader of SEC in sacks prior to the game. Although there were some positives also offensively, which happened before South Carolina’s late first-half flurry. Tide’s second touchdown drive was six plays, recording an average of 11.4 yards per rush. They further strategized their downhill game by using Milroe to put the defense in conflict to keep its offense balanced and explosive.

Klatt further pointed out that if Alabama faces a strong opponent, the offense will need to outscore them. “If they’re playing a really good team, the offense is going to have to outscore the defense, which has just not been existent right now. The defense has major issues, both in their structure and their ability to cover down the field. The 31-yard touchdown that allowed South Carolina to potentially tie the game.”

In the matchup against South Carolina, the third down defense was a struggle again. This was seen largely on the opening second-half touchdown drive and is highly indicative of one coaching mistake and one player execution mistake. The former comes at the third-and-15 when Wommack elects to drop eight into coverage. While everyone was focused on the quarterback, Justin Jefferson was not, and that allowed the Gamecocks to find the sweet spot in the zone and convert. This conversion is on Wommack.

On the player’s end, the things that have been flagged the most are the missed tackles. And in this matchup, Alabama missed a season-high 11 tackles. If this is not indicative of how unprepared Alabama’s defense is, who knows what does!

Moving on, Klatt further added, via his namesake show, “Now they fail in two-point play, but it’s like, how many big plays are we going to see against Alabama? Too many. Too many right now. It’s kind of like the lack of pass rush for Ohio State. We’re just seeing too many explosive plays against Alabama, and that’s something that I warned against, dating all the way back to after the South Florida game.” Now that we have read about Klatt’s comments, it’s time to explore how Alabama performed against South Carolina.

South Carolina nearly upsets Alabama, but Tide holds on

South Carolina pushed Alabama to the edge of suffering its second upset in the SEC. But fortune favored them, and they managed to survive and registered their fifth victory of the season. Tide mishandled the recovery of an onside kick, which gave South Carolina the final opportunity. But defensive back Domani Jackson intercepted LaNorris Sellers and allowed Tide to escape with a narrow victory.

ESPN reported HC Kalen DeBoer’s statements after the game, where he reflected on the team’s ability to pull through in tense situations. “Another game down to the wire,” DeBoer added. “We’re kind of getting accustomed to those. There’s some things that we can do to make sure it doesn’t get to that point. But we always talk about finding a way to win. As many times as it looked like we weren’t, we did.”

Heisman Trophy contender Jalen Milroe rushed for a 7-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter with the help of wide receiver Germie Bernard; he completed a 34-yard touchdown pass. So far throughout the season, he has displayed some phenomenal game plays. Similarly, last Saturday, his significant contribution helped his team to win.

DeBoer further shed light on QB Jalen Milroe’s impressive performance and stated, “There was a lot of safe avenues and things that we discussed on that play and I think that they were aggressive in trying to play a lot of those. There was a deeper route and I love that Jalen saw it.” Crimson Tide will head to Knoxville to face Tennessee, and both teams are aiming for their sixth victory of the season.