By Cecil Hurt - Tuscaloosa News Sports Editor
- BATON ROUGE, La.
It was nothing unfamiliar.
It was nothing unexpected.
Saturday night’s Alabama-
LSU game went the way that games in the Probation Era for Alabama are supposed to go, and the way that a lot of them have gone. This wasn’t a case of Alabama being unprepared, or unemotional, although the defense certainly spent most of the first 20 minutes or so of the game standing flat-footed.
If anything, the Crimson
Tide showed some offensive spark against
LSU. The much-maligned offensive line didn’t keep its quarterback untouched, but its protection was adequate. It wasn’t enough --
LSU had more playmakers, and used them well. Crimson
Tide quarterback John Parker Wilson played like a star in the making at times, but
LSU quarterback Jamarcus Russell played like a star in his prime, a full-grown man making full-grown throws and runs with what seemed at times to be a bare minimum of effort.
But that wasn’t anything that hasn’t been seen before. Neither was the steadily diminishing offensive effectiveness and the end results on the scoreboard. There were two offensive touchdowns. There were no points in the second half. Yes, it was a very good defense on the other side of the ball.
Again, it was nothing unfamiliar. Under normal circumstances, it would be another tough loss, a game to be shrugged off, filed away, a point from which a team moves along on its journey.
Alabama football, though, never operates under entirely normal circumstances, and it certainly isn’t doing so down the stretch of the 2006 season. Every game, instead, has become a popular referendum on the coaching staff, particularly head coach Mike Shula, in the minds of the general public. The minds of UA decision-makers might be a different matter, and probably should be. Still, that’s the way things are - every picture, or in this case, every game tells a story.
Last week’s loss to
Mississippi State, for instance, unleashed a landslide of negative commentary. Angry e-mails flooded into the Alabama athletic department. If the Tide’s fan base wasn’t divided before that loss, it certainly was when the game was over.
This week’s result wasn’t quite so decisive.
For one thing, expectations had reached such a dismal abyss that anything short of an
LSU blowout exceeded those expectations for some people. Alabama wasn’t embarrassed - embarassment avoidance is something Shula has done well at Alabama, last week excepted. Those fans who like Shula will point to that. They’ll point out that Alabama didn’t seem to be a team that had given up on its coaching staff. And they would be right.
On the other side of the aisle, those who are in the winter of their discontent concerning this coaching staff will point to the outcome - a fourth straight loss to
LSU. They’ll note that it’s just one more week in which Alabama failed to score more than two touchdowns in regulation, or
failed to win when trailing going into the fourth quarter. They’ll be right as well.
So, as a referendum, Saturday night’s game isn’t going to mean much.
People will take from it what they want to take.
Next week, though, will be something different.
Auburn isn’t in the business of doing favors for Alabama or for Mike Shula, and they definitely didn’t do so on Saturday, when Georgia hammered them in Jordan-Hare Stadium. Suddenly,
Auburn doesn’t look unbeatable, and if they aren’t unbeatable, then the expectation for Alabama fans next week will be that the Tigers can be beaten. And if they can be beaten, the logic will go, then they should be beaten, and the four-year losing streak should stop.
Two emotional losses in a row won’t be an issue for Alabama, either.
Shula said as much in Baton Rouge on Saturday night.
“There’s a lot for our kids to be motivated by this week," he said. “The
Auburn game is big from a lot of standpoints. They won’t need anything else."
There should be no excuses - and no avoiding the consequences -- for either team.
Alabama’s loss to
LSU on Saturday night should not be a one-game referendum.
Alabama’s game against
Auburn probably shouldn’t be one either. But in
the popular mind of the state of Alabama, it probably will be.
Cecil Hurt is sports editor of the Tuscaloosa News.
LSU game nothing unexpected
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