LOS ANGELES — The fact that Alabama is back in the College Football Playoff for an eighth time in the tournament’s decade-long run should hardly be considered a surprise — not to casual observers nor to the most ardent fans who regularly don houndstooth.
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They are coached by Nick Saban, widely considered the best to ever don a headset at the college level. They beat the two-time, reigning national champions in Atlanta to secure yet another SEC crown. And if you go by raw talent, there’s the Tide and everybody else — with 18 five-stars across the roster, compared to 11 five-srars on the three other Playoff teams combined, according to 247Sports rankings.
Yet this season did not take place in a video game simulation nor a sterile laboratory. Instead, what transpired throughout this 2023 campaign for the Tide was one of adversity and growth to get to this season’s Rose Bowl semifinal game.
While in many ways the program is simply — and coldly — living up to self-imposed expectations, the reality is that few could have imagined them being on the cusp of the national title game following a disappointing double-digit home loss to Texas and subsequent narrow win over a mediocre USF side.
“Alabama has a standard, National Championship or bust. At that time, guys couldn’t see us making it to this point right now,” offensive tackle JC Latham said of the team’s early struggles. “You can’t win a National Championship in Week 2. So we were not focused on the necessary end result after that loss. We were mainly focused on how we can get better. It showed us in what areas we can get better. Saban said it was a test, and we passed in some areas, but we failed in more, which is why we lost the game (against Texas).”
Like most of their peers across the country, the Tide got better as the season wore on. The natural growth that comes with practices and game time led to Alabama looking far closer to the concept of Alabama that we have come to expect.
That growth allowed the Tide to reach an extra gear simply unattainable by all but a handful of programs. They promptly ran off 11 straight victories after falling to the Longhorns, the fifth-longest winning streak in the country (which also included four wins over ranked opponents). Despite two close calls against rivals Auburn and Georgia by a combined six points, the average margin of victory during this surge toward the Playoff is still an impressive 16.2 points per game.
