Offenses, not D’s, to decide big clash
LSU began looking at Alabama’s offense during the spring, eight or nine months before Saturday’s matchup between the top-ranked teams in the Amway Coaches Poll. At daybreak Monday, the Tigers’ defensive coaching staff met to discuss how to slow down the Crimson Tide’s quick-slant passing game, which looks to deliver the ball in stride to the nation’s most impressive receiver corps.
The helmets and jerseys are the same; Nick Saban keeps chugging along as Alabama’s head coach; the defenses remain stingy, if to a lesser degree than in the recent past; and the Tigers and Tide are still among the gold standard in the Bowl Subdivision. Yet much has changed since the last time LSU won a game in this series, during the famous 9-6 overtime victory eight years ago this week, and nowhere is the shift in style and approach more evident than in how this game will be centered on offensive fireworks.
“I feel the game has changed,” said former Alabama running back and NFL MVP Shaun Alexander, who will make an appearance pregame at Bryant-Denny Stadium with the Amway Coaches Poll Trophy, which is awarded in conjunction with the American Football Coaches Association to the winner of the College Football Playoff. “You even compare it to Coach Saban’s first team (at Alabama). It was run the ball, stop the run, make everybody one-dimensional, don’t turn over the football and the defense would really just choke the life out of you.”
Alabama ranks ninth nationally in yards per game, second in yards per play and second in scoring. Behind a revamped scheme, LSU ranks fourth in yards per game, fifth in yards per play and fourth in scoring. An offense that was once often the program’s worst enemy has turned dominant and is suddenly pushing LSU to the forefront of the Playoff race.
The LSU offense is a “totally different offensive scheme,” Saban said, with the “capability to create balance in the offense. They spread you out and create some matchup problems because of the great skill guys that they have outside in their wide receiver corps.”
The Tigers’ better-late-than-never embrace of a spread-based system has changed the program’s trajectory under coach Ed Orgeron and served as the clearest signal that offensive ingenuity now rules at the highest level.
Alabama and LSU once looked strikingly similar on both sides of the ball – unsurprisingly, given how Saban won a national title with the Tigers before joining Alabama.
The Tide’s balance and explosiveness, berthed roughly five seasons ago with a move toward a shotgun-heavy system reliant on quarterback play, stood in stark contrast to LSU’s plodding and antiquated philosophy. Eventually, LSU decided to imitate Alabama’s change in style.
So in 2019, LSU and Alabama will be decided on offense. Unlike in 2011, defense alone no longer wins championships.