While Tua Tagovailoa may have burst onto the scene this time last year with one of the most epic second-half national championship game performances in college football history, this year he looked completely overmatched in the second half against Clemson.

Alabama was down by 15 heading into halftime against Clemson, but instead of making the critical adjustments at the break, the Crimson Tide went the other direction and were shutout in the second half and eventually losing by 28 points on Monday night.

Much of that had to do with the performance of Tagovailoa, who finished the game completing 22 of 34 passes for 295 yards and two scores but he also had two critical interceptions. The first arguably set the tone of the game, it was a pick-6 and the first score of the game for either team, while the other appeared to be a miss-read of Clemson’s defense.

What was it about Brent Venables defense that had Tua so rattled in the game? Alabama’s star quarterback was asked that question after the game, specifically on the pick-6 he threw early in the game.

“I don’t think it was anything that they were doing that stopped us. That was totally a bad decision. It was a poor decision on my part,” Tagovailoa said. “I just think we came out, and we were killing ourselves. We shot ourselves in the foot by me throwing that interception for a touchdown, and then not finishing drives the way we wanted to. Just didn’t go the way we wanted to.”

Another killer for the Tide in this game was the team’s poor performance in the red zone. The Crimson Tide entered the red zone four times but came up empty twice and once had to settle for a field goal. On a night where Nick Saban’s defense struggled so mightily, that lack of execution did Alabama against Clemson.

What was the offense’s issue down near the goal line?

“We just weren’t executing what we were — what the plays were. We just didn’t punch it in. That’s basically all it was,” Tagovailoa said after the game.

In a game that likely shocked nearly everyone that watched it, perhaps the most bizarre aspect was Alabama’s lack of execution on offense. While many were eager to say heading into the game that this was Saban’s best offense of his Alabama tenure, the unit didn’t execute when it really mattered, and this team proved it was never built to slow down a high-powered offense like Clemson’s.