A disaster could be brewing for Alabama football. The eighth-ranked Crimson Tide was heavily favored entering its 2025 season-opener against Florida State but lost 31-17 in Tallahassee.
The loss throws plenty into question for UA. In Kalen DeBoer’s second season, one with plenty of optimism coming from the program before the game, is it possible that the Tide could be worse than last year?
As Alabama begins to try and turn its year around, here’s what the loss could mean for the Crimson Tide moving forward.
Playoff chances
Fortunately for the Crimson Tide, one loss doesn’t doom a season anymore. Alabama lost three games last year and still nearly made the field over an SMU squad that had suffered one regular season defeat before dropping the ACC championship game.
Given the changes the College Football Playoff made to its selection metrics during the offseason, the SEC will get the benefit of the doubt this year. However, the season-opening loss begs the question of whether Alabama will be in a position to get said benefit of the doubt.
The Florida State game was supposed to be an easy win. The loss didn’t exactly instill confidence that the Crimson Tide is ready to take care of business.
Alabama will have more chances to make the playoff. However, with difficult games against the likes of Georgia, LSU and Auburn coming down the pipe, DeBoer and company will need to pull things together.
Is there a way for the loss to age well?
Maybe Florida State is back to its powerful former self, after a two-win 2024 season. That’s the best case scenario for Alabama.
Perhaps the Crimson Tide just lost to an equally talented peer. If not, it would seem that DeBoer and his staff didn’t solve the most pressing issue.
Castellanos looked sharper than he did at Boston College, perhaps a sign that Gus Malzahn’s offense could be successful in Tallahassee. If that’s the case, Florida State could be in for a solid season, and certainly an improvement over its 2024 situation.
Alabama should hope that the Seminoles are in fact back to being a CFP contender. If so, the loss won’t look quite so bad come the end of the year.
If not, Saturday’s defeat could be a hard one to excuse.
Is Alabama’s Achilles heel exactly the same as last year’s?
If Kalen DeBoer is going to turn around his Alabama tenure, he simply must learn to win games like this. Sure, Florida State looked much improved over its 2024 disaster, but still, the Crimson Tide should have been more ready.
The same thing that happened against Vanderbilt and Oklahoma last year cost DeBoer and company again against Florida State. Alabama couldn’t get off the field enough on third down, and a mobile quarterback caused major problems for the defense.
Late in the game, FSU mistakes begged for the Crimson Tide to mount a comeback. However, Alabama’s offense stagnated and couldn’t pull it off.
UA coaches and players spent much of the offseason talking about how the 2025 team was going to learn from the past mistakes. Instead, live on national television, the Tide repeated all of them.
If it’s going to turn the season around, that can’t happen again.
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