A Look into the College Football Playoff National Title Game
Somehow, we made it! It has been one of the craziest college football seasons of recent memory, but we made it to the College Football Playoff National Championship Game between Ohio State and Alabama. For what I thought was a pretty boring playoff field, we get an excellent matchup of strengths in the title game.
Here’s a couple of things I’m looking out for when the teams suit up on Monday:
How will the Alabama defense fare against another star quarterback?
Nick Saban has been the standard in terms of adapting to the current tide of college football. Early in his career, it was all about the defense, now he has transformed this roster into one of the best offenses the sport has seen. So how much has his defense regressed?
If you take a look at the broad numbers, it was a pretty solid season for the ‘Bama defense. They allowed under 20.0 pts/game and about 350.0 yards/games. There was a stretch in the second half of the season over six games where the Tide didn’t allow more than 17 points. In three of those games, the Tide didn’t even allow a touchdown. Pretty impressive right?
There’s a catch. In that stretch, Alabama faced Tennessee, Mississippi State, Kentucky, LSU, Auburn, and Arkansas, all very middling offenses, in fact, probably the worst stretch of offenses in the SEC.
If we look at the two times Alabama faced Ole Miss and Florida, the Tide defense tells a much different story.
The Rebels’ Matt Corral tore apart the Crimson Tide for 365 yards and 13.0 yards/attempt. Ole Miss managed 268 more yards on the ground. Lane Kiffin and Co. did whatever they wanted against Saban’s defense. The only saving grace for Alabama was the historic offense of their own, and one of the worst defenses we have ever seen on the Ole Miss side. That was back in October, how about a more recent example?
Lots of teams struggled to stop Kyle Trask and the Florida Gators this season, and Alabama was no exception. Trask tossed for over 400 yards and three touchdowns in the SEC Championship game as ‘Bama had to hold off Florida storming back in the second half to win 52-46.
Alabama has played a pretty weak schedule of quarterbacks this year, and has been torn up by teams effective at moving the ball down the field. I think Justin Fields is going to get a prime chance to build off his semifinal performance.
Will we see Jaylen Waddle?
Jaylen Waddle returned to practice this week after suffering a nasty ankle injury in October. Alabama listed him as a game-day decision, I wouldn’t be shocked if we see Waddle in a limited capacity of some sort.
I love watching Waddle play. He’s a juiced-up version of Henry Ruggs and an electric returner. He topped 120 yards in each of the four games this season and scored four touchdowns. He’s a lock to go in the top half of the first round. The Alabama offense is on a different gear when Waddle suits up.
How healthy is Justin Fields?
We all saw Justin FIelds get cracked by James Skalski and hobble around the sidelines in pain. We also saw him deliver one of the greatest quarterback performances we’ve seen on the sports’ biggest stage.
Fields have said multiple times that he will be all good to go for Monday’s National Championship game. We don’t know how severe Fields’ injury was, Ohio State didn’t disclose it. Will another hit in that area jolt Fields back into pain? We saw how that worked out for Clemson the first time.
Who will win?
This is so tough. I didn’t see the gutsy performance from Ohio State coming in the semifinals, they looked electric. I was wrong.
I just have a really hard time seeing anyone beating Alabama. Justin Fields will be the best quarterback the Crimson Tide have faced this season, but even when Alabama has gotten torn apart on defense, Mac Jones and DeVonta Smith have bailed them out. If Waddle is back, that’s just another advantage.
It’s going to be a fireworks show between the two quarterbacks. I’m going to have to lean on Alabama.
PREDICTION: ALABAMA 51 OHIO STATE 38
Writer
-By: TJ Mathewson