With LSU vs. Alabama, College Football Playoff unofficially begins Saturday night

For all the Game(s) of the Century and Saban Bowls, all the SEC West battles and national championship showdowns, there’s never been an LSU-Alabama battle quite like the one about to unfold this weekend. The College Football Playoff effectively begins on Saturday night in Death Valley.

Alabama (6-2, 3-2 in SEC) travels to Baton Rouge to face LSU (6-2, 3-1) with, in all likelihood, a CFP playoff berth at stake. Though the two teams have identical records, Alabama ranked 11th in the first CFP bracket and LSU an also-receiving-votes 15th, primarily because of Alabama’s September victory over Georgia. But as that victory recedes further in the rear view, Alabama and LSU both need to avoid that crucial third loss.

The two teams have met 88 times since 1895, with Alabama leading the rivalry 56-27-6. No season defines the Alabama-LSU rivalry quite like 2011, when No. 1 LSU beat No. 2 Alabama 9-6 in the regular season … and then, thanks to the magic of upsets, voters, computers and the BCS, a rematch went Alabama’s way in January. Eight years later, with LSU and Alabama once again ranked No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, the Tigers’ Joe Burrow outplayed the Tide’s Tua Tagovailoa, knocking Alabama out of the playoff hunt as part of LSU’s absolute domination of the 2019 college football season.

This year, the college football juggernauts are in Georgia and Oregon, not Alabama and Louisiana. The Tigers and Tide have both struggled with inconsistency and focus that led directly to their two losses. LSU fell in its debut game against what’s turned out to be a shoddy USC team, then dropped a battle for the SEC lead with Texas A&M. Alabama got beat up by the state of Tennessee, losing in an epochal upset to Vanderbilt and then running out of gas against the Volunteers.

Both coaches said all the right things in the lead-up to the game. “Each and every week in the SEC is an incredible challenge, and one that we’ll have to meet with the best game of the year,” LSU head coach Brian Kelly said this week. “Lot of excitement with GameDay being here, and certainly a prime-time nationally televised game creates a lot of excitement. But with that, you have to do a great job with your preparation and focus on playing four quarters of outstanding football.”

“I see a team that has great athletes, offensively, defensively, explosive,” Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer said of LSU. “Well coached. Have been through the fire, home, away, close games.”

The Tide have been preparing to play in one of the most hostile environments in college football. “The offense is sick of hearing, the last two weeks, a speaker,” DeBoer said on his “Hey Coach” call-in show. “Probably lost some hearing the last two weeks.”

That might be for the best, considering the words Tiger fans will have for the Tide. There’s a bit of a hatred mismatch here; LSU fans tend to consider Alabama their most hated rival, while Alabama fans rank LSU well behind Auburn, Tennessee and possibly even Georgia on the most-hated-programs list. That’s in part because Nick Saban left LSU for the NFL after winning a championship for the Tigers … then turned right back around and returned to the SEC West when Alabama opened up a bank vault for him in 2006.

Alabama’s relative disregard for the Tigers comes from the fact that, well, the Tide got Saban … and also the fact that Alabama largely owned LSU during the Saban era; the Tide had a 13-5 record, including the national championship game, against LSU since Saban’s first season at Alabama.

But Saban ain’t on the sidelines anymore, even if Kelly hints that Saban is still the “man behind the curtain” at Alabama, as Kelly said this week. “I don’t want to take anything away from Coach DeBoer because it’s his team,” Kelly added, “but you do sense a little bit of Nick there.”

Alabama could use a little of the old Saban magic on the sidelines; the team’s inconsistency and inefficiency has bled through on both sides of the ball. Quarterback Jalen Milroe already has as many interceptions (6) as he did all last season. And Alabama as a team ranks 128th out of 134 in penalties per game; only Ole Miss is worse in the SEC.

Meanwhile, LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier is thriving; he leads the SEC in both completions and attempts, and his 20 touchdowns are seven more than Milroe’s to date. (One quirky footnote: Nussmeier’s father, Doug Nussmeier, was Saban’s offensive coordinator on the 2013 national championship team, when Alabama blew out a Notre Dame team coached by … Brian Kelly. “Yeah, he’s brought it up,” Kelly laughed Wednesday. “And I told him to shut up, and not to bring it up again.”)

Alabama is a 2.5-point favorite in the game, but it’s worth noting that Kelly is 13-0 in the many night games at LSU. Someone’s going to ruin someone else’s year in Death Valley on Saturday night, just a little earlier than usual.