Happy Friday, everyone. Both the baseball and softball teams are scheduled to play at home this weekend, but looking at the weather forecast there’s probably a better chance of Jussie Smollett getting a Christmas card from Chicago’s police chief. The Gym Tide are in Lexington to face #13 Kentucky tonight at 7pm. You can watch online at SEC Network +.
Folks are still talking about the football staff shakeup.
“I think in most years I would be concerned, but in this year in a lot of ways it might be addition by subtraction,” McElroy told Sporting News. “Not to discredit the previous coaching staff, but when you have so many new voices there can be some mixed messaging within the coaching staff.
”When you’re new to the staff and you don’t know how the program is run that can lead to some miscommunication,” he said. “That’s kind of what transpired this year, and that showed at the end.”
The widespread critical analysis of a 14-1 season speaks to just how high Saban has set the bar. Alabama’s defense clearly wasn’t up to its own lofty standard, yet still finished #7 according to S&P+. In fact, the Tide finished #1 overall in both S&P+ and F/+, even with the Clemson loss factored in. Still, there were more mental errors than usual and things didn’t seem to mesh quite the same. Hopefully having some more familiarity on the staff will make an impact.
The Tide lost two young staffers and added replacements.
Joe Houston from Iowa State and Johnathan Galante from Virginia Tech have joined the Alabama staff, as first reported by The Athletic.
Houston and Galante have both confirmed the news on Twitter, having updated their Twitter bios with their new job titles for the Crimson Tide.
Houston, a former USC kicker, had been at Iowa State since 2016 and was the team’s special teams coordinator last season.
In basketball news, the ladies are having a tough year but got a nice win yesterday.
“I’m really proud of this team and their response after Sunday,” head coach Kristy Curry said. “We know we need to be consistent with this type of response, but I love the kids in that locker room, all the credit to them because they played their guts out. It’s a tough place to play and it’s a tough place on the road in this league. Vanderbilt is a tough team, they’ve been after some folks and have had close games down the stretch. I just credit our kids, we had great balance tonight.”
Congrats to Coach Curry and team.
Last, Cecil Hurt is still pulling no punches with the men’s squad.
Florida, with its back to the wall just as squarely as Alabama’s one week ago, responded by going on the road, dominating in Tuscaloosa, then following that up with an overtime win at LSU in what was one of the best SEC games of the year. The Gators were an absolute model of tenacity and mental toughness, responding with big shot after big shot, answering every time LSU made a run.
When has Alabama displayed that sort of toughness this season? In Knoxville, perhaps, a loss that probably did more to give Alabama fans hope at the time than any other game UA has played. But what has happened in the last month to nurture that hope?
Not much, Cecil. Hopefully something will click and the veterans on this team will step up on defense. That should be the strength of this team.
That’s about it for today. Have a great weekend.
Roll Tide.