In case you haven't noticed, a blowout of Western Carolina, a 2 touchdown win over Vanderbilt, and a come from behind home win over Arkansas have convinced some of the more delusional elements of the Alabama fanbase that it's 1978 all over again, and that they're a BCS Title contender. Frankly, with Auburn, Florida State and Tennessee looking craptacular, we may be the best team they play before a late season showdown with Les Miles U.
Alabama may in fact win tomorrow's game. There's no doubt about that. This has all the makings of a classic SEC slugfest in which both teams absolutely knock the unholy crap out of each other for 58 minutes, with one having to make a defensive stop at the end to seal the deal. Bama's defense has been solid and, speaking frankly, looks a lot physically tougher than they did during the Shula regime. Terry Grant looks to be their tailback of the future, with help from Coffee and Upchurch. D.J. Hall is capable of making J.P. Wilson look good even when he's not. When Wilson is on, he can spray the ball around and move it downfield in a hurry, so long as he doesn't do anything stupid (sound like anybody we know, Bulldog fans?). Their offensive line is probably the best one in the SEC not playing for a guy who wears baseball caps that make him look like Elmer Fudd, or a guy who can't keep his cellphone records private. But this Alabama team is not quite one of the top 5 in the country, at least not yet.
The gang at Roll Bama Roll has two interesting and informative Q & A's with Paul Westerdawg, and Doug from Hey Jenny Slater. Paul has likewise posted some interesting pregame thoughts from SB Nation's Bama blog, who also made an appearance en mass over at Doug's place. Doug, by the way, earned immense respect from me today when I learned that he also believes that the final show of R.E.M. 's Monster tour at the Omni in 1995 was one of the best concerts he's ever been to. +2 for Doug. Of course he's also a not-so-closeted Milli Vanilli Fan, but I'm willing to overlook that.
Personally, I've put all the heavy thinking into this game that I intend to. At this point, I'm just going to sit back and see if Saban can bring Alabama football back to its glory days of polyester and two for one Mai Tais. You remember, Bama Nation. It looked something like this:
As a lifelong Bear Bryant enthusiast, that was hard to do. But it just had to be done. I may be going to football Hell for it, but it had to be done. Everybody have a great one!
Go Dawgs!