Football
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Former Alabama coach Nick Saban has spoken about the Crimson Tide’s exclusion from the 2024 College Football Playoff.
Alabama was the first team out of the 12-team field with the committee choosing SMU for the final at-large spot. Following the news, Saban expressed his concerns on the ESPN Selection Show broadcast and warned that the result could devalue the benefits of scheduling difficult opponents during the regular season.
I think one of the things I have mentioned throughout this football season is if we don’t take strength of schedule into consideration, is there any benefit to scheduling really good teams in the future? Like here at Alabama, we’re supposed to play Notre Dame Ohio State Wisconsin, Florida State in the future outside the league. Those are great games for fans to see, and that’s what I think we should be doing in college football is creating more inventory for great games that people are interested in. But do you enhance people wanting to do that where what’s the athletic director going to do? He may go cancel all those games now knowing that the SEC is tough enough.
He then did note that he believes “the best teams are in the playoff” and that Alabama, among the other teams who just missed out on the field, had the opportunity to “control its own destiny.”
CFP chairman Warde Manuel acknowledged on the broadcast that the committee had “quite a debate” over Alabama and SMU but that SMU’s performance in the ACC Championship game pushed the Mustangs over the edge.
Ross Dellenger @RossDellenger
CFP chair Warde Manuel said the committee had “quite a debate” over Alabama and SMU.
“The way SMU played in that (ACC title) game, losing on a last second FG. We felt like in this case SMU had the nod above Alabama, but it’s no disrespect to Alabama’s strength of schedule.”
Alabama finished 9-3 and did not qualify for the SEC Championship. The program had strong wins over South Carolina, LSU, Missouri and most notably a Georgia team that won the SEC Championship and earned the No. 2 seed in the field.
Alabama lost to Tennessee, who earned the No. 9 seed, but also lost to Vanderbilt and Oklahoma. Both of those teams finished the season 6-6.
SMU, on the other hand, finished the regular season 11-1 and lost the ACC Championship to Clemson on a walk-off field goal. While SMU had the superior record and did reach its conference championship, the Mustangs did not defeat a ranked opponent. Both losses came to ranked opponents but the lack of a true signature win had many wondering if Alabama would steal that final spot.
The committee sided with SMU in this case, while Alabama will enter a non-playoff Bowl Game to conclude the season.
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