Alabama football shocked the college football world with a 24-21 upset victory over No. 5 Georgia on Saturday, and it is going to help take the heat off of head coach Kalen DeBoer.
The then-No. 8-ranked Crimson Tide drew some ire when they got blown out 31-17 by then-unranked Florida State to start the season. Alabama is coming off a disappointing 9-4 season that saw the Tide go 5-3 in the SEC.
DeBoer's seat was hot coming into the year already. The heat was turned up last season when Bama lost 24-3 against unranked Oklahoma in the second-to-last game of the season. At the time, they were showing an inability to take care of business in big games and were utterly embarrassed at times.
But this year's Alabama team looks different after they were able to take down a top five team in the Georgia Bulldogs.
For starters, the Crimson Tide were able to bounce back quickly after Week 1. They were utterly dominant in Weeks 2 and 3, defeating UL Monroe by 73 points in a shutout victory before defeating Wisconsin, 38-14, in a game that never felt close.
Saturday night's Week 4 victory against Georgia signifies a return to something that was a regularity in the Nick Saban era – a team that is not scared of anyone it is playing against, regardless of who it is, because it knows it can flat out dominate.
Alabama lost that at times throughout DeBoer's first year as head coach.
Cracks started to show when Vanderbilt defeated the Tide in a thrilling 40-35 upset victory that helped transform the Commodores from the joke of the SEC to an upstart program that is still making noise in college football's biggest power conference this year.
The next two weeks saw the Crimson Tide get dragged into another close game with South Carolina before they suffered yet another loss. The Tennessee Volunteers scored all of their 24 points in the second half and held Alabama to just 75 yards on the ground in a game where the Crimson Tide looked utterly outmatched.
With Alabama getting outmatched again twice more in 2024, both by a lowly 6-6 Sooners squad in Norman late in the regular season and in a 19-13 loss to Michigan in the Reliaquest Bowl in Tampa Bay, it seemed like the Crimson Tide were taking a slide in the DeBoer era.
They did not look like that kind of team in their win over Georgia in Week 4.
Alabama took a quick 14-0 lead early in the second quarter and never let go of it. After briefly trading scores with Georgia, Alabama held on to the 24-21 lead by holding Georgia to 83 yards in the fourth quarter. They forced a turnover on downs on Georgia's first drive of the quarter by stuffing Cash Jones on a 4th-and-1 with a three-yard loss on their own 11. Bama then forced Georgia to punt on its final drive of the game and was able to bleed out the rest of the clock with an eight-play, 3:19 drive to win the game.
A dominant defensive stand against one of the best teams in the country is a step in the right direction for DeBoer's squad. And it may be enough for them to get their season back on track and stay in SEC contention.
