LSU vs Alabama Game Lived Up to the Hype
How great is it, when a much-heralded, and anticipated sporting event actually lives up to the hype?
So often, a contest that’s the hot topic of discussion leading up fails to deliver.
That certainly wasn’t the case last weekend, when LSU and Alabama staged their showdown in Tuscaloosa. The two SEC powers coming in at a perfect 8-0, and so much riding on the outcome with strong playoff implications staged a battle-royal that had everything: A high-scoring game, a somewhat shocking outcome, a star player questionable to play, starting slowly, then leading a dramatic comeback that fell short, and, perhaps, a changing of the guard in the big picture of college football.
LSU ran and passed all over the vaunted ‘Bama defense to the tune of 46-41 and made its claim as the number one team in the nation.
LSU WINS!
Those who live in Columbus and follow the Scarlet and Gray of Ohio State might fiercely disagree, but that’s why we have a championship playoff.
Let’s not forget about Clemson, which everyone seems to do.
The Tigers are the defending national champions who are unbeaten along with LSU and Ohio State.
But the Tigers from the ACC are different from the Tigers of the SEC.
The Bayou Bengals play in the toughest conference of them all and face powerhouses. The orange clad Tigers from South Carolina don’t.
They just win, baby!
Maybe Clemson can beat LSU, who knows?
Again, that’s why we have a four-team playoff.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
By beating the Crimson Tide after losing eight straight times, LSU established themselves as a team that no longer is one-dimensional.
The Tigers have never been known as a passing team, never been known as a spawning ground for top quarterbacks.
Those days maybe over.
Joe Burrow cast his lot as a strong, if not likely Heisman Trophy winner. Alabama, trailing by 20-points at halftime, cut the deficit to six twice in the fourth quarter. But Burrow converted on three critical third downs setting up a touchdown that opened up a 12-point lead with a minute-and-a-half remaining.
Joe Burrow
Alabama came back to score again to narrow LSU’s lead to five. They were carried mostly by quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, considered one of the top two or three quarterbacks in the nation. Tua, playing with an ankle injury got off to a slow start, but threw three touchdown passes into a game filled with palpable drama. But an on-side kick with a little over a minute to go was recovered by wide receiver Justin Jefferson, sealing the victory.
Tua Tagovailoa
A little irony here.
Jefferson’s oldest brother, Jordan, quarterbacked LSU to its last triumph over Alabama in the 2011 version of the “Game of the Century”. That’s when the two schools met on the first weekend in November in Tuscaloosa. Both were unbeaten at the time.
Sound familiar?
It didn’t well for the Tigers, who lost to the Tide in the championship game 17-0.
The question is, will Nick Saban’s crew will now make it to the playoffs at all?
They could. But it won’t be easy.
Georgia is a possibility to move into the charmed circle of four.
But the Bulldogs also lost at home, to South Carolina.
Not the same as ‘Bama dropping one to LSU.
Now that Penn State also has fallen from the ranks of the unbeaten, the duel for the playoffs is wide open for the one spot.
Does that open the door for a Pac-12 school? Oklahoma?
One thing we know.
Expect the unexpected.
We’re into November, and it’s a wonderful time in football.
Big games are played on both the college and NFL stages.
The best is yet to come.
Visions of bowl games, championship playoffs, NFL post-season and
the race for the Super Bowl become the focus.
We live in a world of taking every team’s temperature starting in the opening week of the season. And continuing after every single game.
Who’s up? Who’s down?
For those who play stock market football, their emotions constantly ride on what happened last.
What we know, is that the teams who play the best down the stretch are there at the end.
That’s why in the NFL, for example, we haven’t gotten to that point.
We have a better idea in the college fame.
There are conference championship games to be played and that will
be telling.
But you kind of know, Ohio State and Clemson are on a pedestal.
And so is LSU.
It could have gone either way before they collided with The Tide last week.
Alabama, as usual. Or LSU, who won its first title in 1958, when a coach named Paul Dietzel, and a Heisman Trophy winner named Billy Cannon.
Billy Cannon
They won their second championship in 2003, under a coach named Nick Saban.
The Tigers took it all a third time, in 2007. Les Miles was their head coach.
The team they beat? Ohio State.
Is a rematch in the offing?
If LSU gets there. They will point to a game that people will say was as good, if not better, than was promised.
The November thriller in Tuscaloosa.
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LEADERSHIP • A WINNING ATTITUDE • INSPIRATION • TEAMWORK
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