Alabama football did not start the 2025 season the way they intended. The Crimson Tide were crushed by the Seminoles 31-17 in the season opener. Now there is already talk that Alabama's head coach could be on the hot seat and it isn't even Labor Day yet.
ESPN's Paul Finebaum declared that DeBoer is already on a “scorching” hot seat after the terrible season opener.
“It was a shattering loss for Kalen DeBoer. He had built up tremendous good will in the offseason. People believed in him after failing to believe in him at the end of last season. But there’s no escaping it,” Finebaum said on SportsCenter on Sunday morning, per On3's Alex Byington. “You started hearing words last night like ‘hot seat,’ ‘buyout,’ which my the way is $70 million. So it was get to the Playoffs or bust, and right now he lost a golden opportunity, because he has about seven or eight tougher games than he had yesterday. His path is very narrow, and his hot seat is very scorching.”
Saturday's loss was DeBoer's fifth defeat since joining the Crimson Tide in 2024. What's worse, it was Alabama football's first loss in a season opener in 24 years.
DeBoer blamed the entire program for their ugly loss against Florida State.
“I don't just point the finger at the players,” DeBoer said, via CBS Sports. “Both sides of the ball, you kind of know what you're going to see going into the game with new coordinators. But we got to, you know, we talked in the locker room, there is no excuse about what happened. We stepped on the football field. They stepped on the football field. We got to play ball. We got to play our style of ball.”
DeBoer is still optimistic that Alabama can turn their season around. After all, the season opener is only one game.
“I choose to believe we’ve got a good football team, but we can’t play on our heels,” DeBoer said. “We’re not going to be what we think we can be, what we want to be, if that’s the case. That falls on everyone.”
The Crimson Tide better start stacking some wins. Otherwise the Kalen DeBoer era in Tuscaloosa could come to a premature end.
Next up for Alabama is a home game against Louisiana-Monroe on September 6th.
