The 3 matchups that will help decide Alabama’s Playoff showdown at Oklahoma
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After 2 November games gone wrong the past 2 seasons, Alabama has a chance to finally make things right against Oklahoma, and this time with absolutely everything on the line.
On Friday night in Norman, in an 8 p.m. ET kickoff on ABC and ESPN, the 9th-seeded Crimson Tide and 8th-seeded Sooners will launch the 2nd 12-team College Football Playoff derby in an all-SEC steel-caged battle with no lifelines this time. Bama is all out of those after suffering that sloppy November home loss to Oklahoma and that listless setback to Georgia 3 weeks later in the SEC title game.
After that commendable 8-game winning streak put them in great shape, the Tide toyed with their Playoff fate and lived to tell about it, losing 2 of their final 4 games but getting the nod on Selection Sunday despite having 3 losses. They are no doubt a flawed team, but all that matters right now is that they’re a Playoff team, controversies be damned, and now they have a chance to go on a championship run.
All Bama has to do to kick-start that is beat the team that Kalen DeBoer hasn’t been able to solve so far during his first 2 seasons in Tuscaloosa. There was the turnover-filled 23-21 loss last month in T-Town and there was the 24-3 egg that Alabama laid 12 months earlier on the same Memorial Stadium field it will return to on Friday night.Â
It wasn’t pretty at all for DeBoer’s team either time, and if Nick Saban‘s successor wants to officially begin a new era of winning at Alabama, he’s got to win this game. This time, there is no fallback. There will be matchups all over the field on Friday night that will determine Bama’s fate, but we’ll narrow it down to these 3 that’ll help decide if DeBoer finally gets that first signature victory:Â
1. The passing game against OU’s secondary, with return of Josh Cuevas
It was those 3 crucial turnovers that prevented the Tide from beating Oklahoma a month ago at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Bama outgained the Sooners and did it handily, by a 406-212 margin, and though Ty Simpson threw 1 of his 5 interceptions this season in that game and lost a fumble, he also threw for 326 yards and a touchdown. So, Simpson should go into Friday night knowing he can have success through the air against this tough OU secondary.
What he also now knows is that he’ll have senior tight end Josh Cuevas at his disposal again, and that’s a huge thing, particularly in this matchup. Because Cuevas just happened to have a career game against these Sooners last month, catching 6 passes for 80 yards and that TD Simpson threw. Cuevas is a key cog for Bama no matter who the opponent is, but he showed a particular effectiveness that day against Oklahoma that should be so crucial again, especially in a hostile environment this time.
Kalen DeBoer confirmed after Wednesday’s practice that Cuevas will be out there again, providing a huge safety valve for Simpson. Cuevas injured his foot in practice leading up to the Eastern Illinois game on Nov. 22, which just happened to be the week after his strong performance against Oklahoma. He missed that Eastern Illinois game, as well as the Iron Bowl and the SEC title game, so the injury was more than a nagging one. It was substantial indeed, and the clock was ticking on Cuevas toward Friday night before it was revealed that he was good to go. DeBoer told reporters after Monday’s practice that Cuevas was “making progress” and “you’re optimistic at this point,” so things had been trending in the right direction.
Cuevas has 30 catches for 341 yards and 4 touchdowns this season, and that’s just in 10 games with him missing the past 3. Simpson called Cuevas “very important” to the offense, termed his mere presence “remarkable” and said it’s a “different type of vibe when he’s in there” when speaking to reporters on Monday. Those are heavy words from the quarterback, and now that we know Cuevas will play it could be a difference maker for Simpson and the Tide.
Simpson had his 3rd-highest passing yards total of the season against this tough Oklahoma secondary. He found Germie Bernard 7 times for 71 yards and hooked up with Isaiah Horton 3 times for 56 yards, and even the much-maligned Ryan Williams caught 3 balls for 45 yards. But all of that nice balance in the passing game came with Cuevas in there, which shows how crucial his return on Friday night really is.
Without those turnovers a month ago in Tuscaloosa, Alabama wins that game. It still nearly won with the turnovers — and a missed field goal, too. It’s not like that special OU defense, which ranks first in the SEC in scoring defense and total defense, was anything special against the Tide. And the Sooners struggled to slow down Simpson through the air. That’s got to give Bama some real confidence going into Norman — and, yeah, it will really, really help having Cuevas back out there on Friday night.
2. Bama’s D trying to corral John Mateer for 2nd time in a month
Mateer walked out of Bryant-Denny Stadium a winner last month, but that doesn’t mean he necessarily outplayed Ty Simpson or even put up great numbers against Kane Wommack’s defense. Neither are really true. Simpson had the much better stats, with 326 yards passing and 1 touchdown, but for a change he was the quarterback who made the back-breaking errors — an early pick-6 and a lost fumble — while Mateer stayed under the radar, going 15 for 23 with just 138 yards through the air but also with 0 turnovers.
It didn’t look super impressive, and it wasn’t. But Mateer and the Sooners scooped up all those Tide errors and turned them into a huge road victory that kept their Playoff hopes alive. A little over a month later, here they are in that Playoff, hosting the same Alabama team and hoping they won’t need all of that goodwill again from the Crimson Tide. Logic would say they better not, and logic would also say that Mateer will need to put up much better numbers in the rematch for Oklahoma to advance.
The Bama defense as a whole was on point last month against OU, stifling Mateer through the air and limiting the Sooners to 74 yards rushing. When the dust settled, Oklahoma had managed just 212 total yards, which 99 times out of 100 would be good enough to win. But the stingy D that day was a victim of those Tide turnovers, including the brutal pick-6, as Bama handed the Sooners short fields that made life difficult for its defense.
That Crimson Tide D responded as admirably as it could, sacking Mateer twice and posting 4 tackles-for-loss. Bama also had 3 pass deflections, so there was strong play going on at every level of the defense. It wasn’t good enough on Nov. 15, but that’s ancient history, because what matters now is Friday night, and if Wommack’s unit gives him anything close to what it gave him last month, Alabama has a great shot to get out of Norman alive.
There is 1 thing though, a very big thing, that Bama’s D will have to overcome. Senior defensive end LT Overton, who has 33 total tackles this season, 20 of them solo, to go with 4 sacks, is going to miss his 2nd straight game with what Kalen DeBoer has called an illness or medical condition. Overton’s presence was certainly missed in the SEC title game loss to Georgia, and he certainly played a role in slowing down Mateer last month, finishing with 3 tackles, 2 of them solo.
DeBoer told reporters earlier this week that the team would “continue to monitor” Overton but that he is unlikely to play on Friday night, calling his status “doubtful for this weekend.” Then “doubtful” became “out” for Overton when Bama released its availability report. Not having Overton in the trenches, in a road Playoff game, will obviously be a huge blow to Alabama, so we’ll see on Friday night if Overton’s absence hurts the Tide as much as it did in Atlanta. Alabama allowed 141 yards rushing in the loss to Georgia with Overton sidelined, so his presence and leadership mean that much, and the Tide will have to win without him to give Overton a chance to play in a quarterfinal.
3. Kalen DeBoer vs. Brent Venables — both need this one badly
As much as Friday night is about Alabama and its ability to overcome its flaws, its key injuries and its recent shaky play, it’s also all about DeBoer. He quieted his many critics in Year 2, for now at least, by guiding the Tide to a Playoff berth after that Week 1 fiasco at Florida State drove a passionate and panicked fan base over the edge.
DeBoer did a commendable job keeping the Bama train from falling over the cliff this fall. He led the Tide to 8 straight wins, including 4 SEC ranked victories in a row, and Alabama had just enough in the bank after the OU home loss, squeaking out an Iron Bowl win and slipping into the Playoff despite that SEC title game dud. DeBoer deserves praise, but the real work is now beginning, and he’s got to know that.
Because that first really big moment for Alabama football under DeBoer still hasn’t happened. Not yet at least. It could’ve occurred in Atlanta, but the Tide somehow rushed for minus-3 yards in a 28-7 loss to Georgia that felt much worse. Instead of confetti, there were questions, and DeBoer was extremely fortunate to get a reprieve from the Playoff committee that has landed him and his team in Norman.
Friday night symbolizes a fork in the road for DeBoer as Alabama’s head coach. Either he finally gets that first signature victory or he flies back to Tuscaloosa with a 10-4 record that’s barely better than his 9-4 mark in Year 1. That’s how much this game means to his program and to him, and that factor alone elevates his coaching matchup with Brent Venables into the stratosphere on a primetime Playoff stage.
Then, stepping out of the Bama bubble for a second, consider how much Friday night means to Venables. He has fought through 2 losing seasons in Norman, finally has Oklahoma relevant in his 4th year, is 0-3 in bowl games and now has the home stage in a Playoff game, against Alabama no less. This is very much a watershed moment for Venables, too, and this creates a deliciously desperate situation on both sidelines.
Venables has gotten the better of DeBoer in the regular season twice now, but that won’t matter 1 bit when this Friday night elimination game kicks off at just after 7 p.m. Norman time. DeBoer’s legion of doubters will be waiting to pounce if he loses, and all of the questions about his ability to follow Nick Saban at Alabama will likely come rushing back. Conversely, if DeBoer has a great night in Norman, it likely means his team does, too, and then he can start devising a plan to stop Fernando Mendoza.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
