Joel Klatt compares Alabama to Lincoln Riley-led Oklahoma teams after Vanderbilt loss
We witnessed the biggest upset loss of the season so far in college football this year on Saturday as Vanderbilt took down #1 Alabama. The Crimson Tide were coming off of a massive win against Georgia, and they came out sleepwalking. They got down big early, but even after making a comeback, Vanderbilt just executed better and looked like the better football team. Fox college football analyst Joel Klatt has some major concerns about this Alabama team.
It’s clear that Alabama has a good offense, but the Crimson Tide defense was extremely concerning on Saturday. Because of that, they are reminding Joel Klatt of some past Big 12 teams.
“This Alabama team is just another version of the Lincoln Riley Oklahoma teams,” Klatt said during an appearance on The Next Round. “Incredible explosive offense, and they’re gonna be in shootouts the rest of the way.”
Those Big 12 teams with the explosive offenses and awful defenses were fun to watch in conference play as we got a lot of shootouts, but the recipe to win big in January isn’t there with a team like that.
“Alabama, right now, is just a Big 12 team from 2017…Alabama is gonna have to score 45 PPG in conference to win the rest of their games,” Klatt added.
The Alabama defense is a huge concern
If you’re an Alabama fan, you have to be worried about this defense. The second half collapse against Georgia, and now this. There are problems, and Joel Klatt did a good job laying out what those issues are.
“There’s a problem,” Klatt said. “Structurally, there’s a problem. So they’re kind of stuck between trying to play an even front and an odd front at times. And I don’t think that you can be good at both. Now, you can have the ability to get into both, but you it’s hard to be good at both. So there are times when they get into kind of that three, three stack. They kind of have that, that sniffer player, the linebacker that’s kind of a sniffer player. And then there are times when they get into more of an even front with with four defensive linemen, and they stand up the edges. And the problem when they get into the three three stack is that their edges, there’s no edge player, and so they don’t set the edge, and they’re they’re very susceptible to perimeter runs. And then the problem when they stand their edges up to create harder edges is that they’re not good enough right down the middle. And then you get into this, what I think is is, is an issue of getting in between those structures, is that they’re not very sound as far as their gap responsibility at the second level.”
Those issues were on display all day long against Vanderbilt, and that’s why Alabama gave up 40 points to one of the worst teams in the SEC.
“There were so many times in that game when it’s zone read, whether it’s like you’ve got zone read with an option, or you’ve got a shovel underneath, and you’ve got the defense where there’s two and three players running with one player, so like two or three guys will all take the quarterback, and then the shovel is wide open,” Klatt continued. “Then all of a sudden you’ve got, like a regular zone read, and two players run with the back and the q power in the middle is wide open, or they collapse, and I’m like, guys. The undisciplined nature of their responsibilities jumps off the tape.”
If Vanderbilt was able to expose Alabama like that, the four ranked teams left on the Crimson Tide schedule probably will too.
Alabama needs to get a bounce back week this Saturday as they will be taking on South Carolina at home. The two teams will kick off from Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa at noon ET on Saturday, and the game will be airing on ABC. The Crimson Tide are favored by 21 points.
The post Joel Klatt compares Alabama to Lincoln Riley-led Oklahoma teams after Vanderbilt loss appeared first on ClutchPoints.
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