If anyone ever wants to dismiss key injuries with a sweep of the hand and “it’s just football,” it would do well to watch the debacle that was Alabama-Tennessee in 2026.
While a depleted roster wasn’t the only factor here, and didn’t just affect Alabama – Tennessee lost left tackle David Sanders mid-game to go along with the loss of its best offensive lineman, guard Wendell Moe Jr., who was already a scratch before the start – the end result was that the Alabama team that lost to Tennessee bore very little functional resemblance to the one that mowed through Mississippi State just a couple of weeks before.
Take the medical sheet, add in a heaping helping of turnovers and other mental errors, and Alabama suddenly went from pushing all the right buttons to pushing the panic button in the course of about 14 days.
The fact that Alabama pulled back to within 12-10 at halftime was itself a thing of wonder, but the Crimson Tide was not able to find an answer for the Tennessee defense and sputtered to a 26-10 loss in the end. Alabama’s defense did its best job trying to hold on for dear life for three quarters, but could not its own offense, which looked cumbersome and drug its feet throughout most of the contest. Tennessee capped it all off with a 9-minute drive to put the game on ice. And then there was, and is, the elephant in the room: bad quarterback play.
Out of nowhere against Georgia, Keelon Russell appeared to forget every good thing that had happened to him in the month prior. Against Tennessee, it was more of the same. Russell’s only truly effective play was to scramble, and even that found only tepid success.
The problem here is that Alabama is still a playoff aspirant, but it can’t get there unless its offense – which is predicated on high-level quarterback play – gets what it’s looking for.
As such, the key for Kalen DeBoer and the offensive staff is to find out exactly what Alabama can and can’t do offensively, especially with WR Ryan Coleman-Williams and C Racin Delgatty out for unknown periods. For as many people that Alabama likes to play in a game under DeBoer, Alabama has been overly cautious in returning injured players to the lineup. Neither RB Akylin Dear nor WR Noah Rogers have been really pushed to get back on the field, making cameo appearances in a couple of games but nothing further. If they’re out, fine. But if they’re not, especially in Rogers’ case, they need to be part of the plan going forward – immediately.
Against Tennessee, Alabama didn’t actually run the ball terribly at the outset. At the half, the per-carry average for both teams was hovering in the 3.5-4.0 yards-per-carry range. But it didn’t stay that way. The Tide defense held Tennessee to 3.7 yards per tote on the day, but Alabama’s second-half numbers pulled the average all the way to 2.1 yards per carry. Sacks play a part in that number on the college level, but the big news here was that Tennessee stopped being concerned about Russell beating the Volunteers through the air, and sold out to stop an Alabama running game that appeared to have been drawn up conservatively in the wake of Delgatty’s injury.
As we profiled in our pregame article, Alabama fans were likely underselling just how good this Tennessee roster was. With the injuries factored in, Tennessee turned a near-push, talent-wise, into a significant edge. The Vols were able to overcome their own spotty quarterback play and pull away in the second half.
But the other item to address is that of getting beaten physically on both lines of scrimmage. We have to discuss yet another injury here – DT Terrance Green, which forced Alabama to use Edric Hill and Isaia Faga more than it would have liked – but that doesn’t account for attitude. Too many times, Tennessee took the fight to Alabama’s lines and pushed both of those lines around.
Alabama’s loss wasn’t the worst of the day, or the hardest to explain – Georgia gets that “honor” in losing at home to Auburn – but whether it’s the new reality of college football parity, or more basic, foundational elements, the fact remains that Alabama can’t continue to go down the road it is on if it wants to play for something that matters at year’s end.
Here’s the Five-Point Breakdown for Alabama-Tennessee:
1. Keelon Russell was going to have growing pains; this looked like something more. Russell started the year off in somewhat slow, deliberate fashion against East Carolina, saw his trajectory shoot almost straight upward in the four games after that, then level off steeply against Georgia and stall completely against Tennessee. DeBoer’s offense can withstand a lot but bad play at the quarterback position isn’t one of those things. With a struggling quarterback, it recalls the year Jalen Milroe spent under center, when Alabama’s success or failure in any given week was going to be directly attributable to which Milroe showed up. Keelon Russell is a far better quarterback prospect than Milroe ever was, but the key word in that sentence is “prospect.” Given what he’s put on tape against Georgia and Tennessee, he’s either a lot rawer and more erratic than anyone thought, or he’s just not ready. We may have reached the point where Austin Mack is due a look, but DeBoer tends to avoid multiple-quarterback offenses at all costs. Alabama can only hope Russell gets better; against Tennessee, he didn’t feel the pocket the way he has in the past, and other than on his touchdown scramble, didn’t show particular feel for clearing the rush. Three turnovers will also get you killed in difficult games.
2. Playcall design changed, especially in the run game, perhaps with the OL in mind. There were two issues here, enough that we need two of our five points to cover them. At the 20,000-foot level, there was the design of the Alabama running game and some of its protection packages, which appear to have been simplified a good bit with Mal Waldrep Jr. at center rather than Racin Delgatty. Alabama seemed to spend more time blocking duo and power and less active in the slant-zone and pin/pull game. That may have partly been due to facing a team with a defensive line of smaller size, but we think it was probably more due to the available personnel. The problem was the running game, which was barely functional at the half, fell apart as the game went along.
3. Waldrep, offensive tackles didn’t have their best games: One thing that will have to be coached out of Waldrep immediately: nodding his head just prior to snapping the ball, thereby giving away the snap count. We’re hoping this was a silent count issue developed to keep the Neyland Stadium noise out of the snap sequence, but silent count or not, Waldrep was visually tipping his snaps. Then there was the issue of pass protection. This was not the finest game from either Jayvin James or Jackson Lloyd, although Russell did them no favors by being slow to feel edge pressures. We’re not sure whether James is back to 100 percent, although he did not appear to be affected by whatever injury caused him to miss the Mississippi State game, but this was not a vintage Bama OL day. Alabama yielded 5 sacks, 10 tackles for loss, 3 QB hurries and a pass broken up at the line. The middle of the line was erratic in getting a push even against a smaller defensive line.
4. Tennessee ILB group set everything up for the Vol defense, and Knowles should get credit. Jim Knowles is an elite defensive coordinator with a long track record of success and this year has been no different for him, even if it is his first in Knoxville. The run fits were superb, and keeping Alabama from being to execute its inside zone game had a trickle-down effect that ended up with Keelon Russell at the bottom of a pile, more often than not. The Tennessee defensive line very clearly won its matchup against the Alabama OL, and when the front seven is operating with that kind of efficiency and polish, the secondary is going to look just as good. Alabama had no answers.
5. The loss of Ryan Coleman-Williams removed all explosiveness. We talked about it in the pregame as to whether Alabama had an answer for replacing its WR1; it did not. Noah Rogers is apparently still not able to do what is needed physically to take on a heavy workload. Without either Coleman-Williams or Rogers, Alabama got very average. Lotzeir Brooks is effective as a slot receiver and complementary piece, but simply lacks the size to be a primary wideout on an SEC roster. Rico Scott, improved as he has been, lacks catch reliability. That left Alabama searching for answers, and Derek Meadows, Coleman-Williams’ replacement, caught 2 passes for just 8 yards. All of this fits together, with the struggles at quarterback and an offensive line fighting to protect, but Bama needed someone to step up here and it didn’t happen.
Follow Jess Nicholas on X at @TideFansJessN