Alabama Football: Week 2 SEC Football Power Rankings
The first official week of SEC football is in the books and here are Bama Hammer’s Week 2 conference Power Rankings.
SEC football had some highs and lows in week one of the season. The league picked up seven, out-of-conference wins. All seven should have been wins. The four losses among SEC football teams included a couple of big disappointments and one very big stinker.
1. Alabama
It wasn’t always pretty (the Tide’s first scoreless first quarter in an opener under Saban), but once Alabama football got it going, an overmatched Duke Blue Devils team was loathe to stop the No. 2 team in the country.
While there were few explosive plays from the offense, the short, intermediate throws from Tua allowed the best receiving corps in the FBS to do what they do: make plays. WR Jeudy had a Biletnikoff-worthy opening to his season, hauling in 10 catches (a personal best) for 137 yards and a touchdown. The interior of the offensive line is still a work in progress as the running game had a difficult time getting it going, but over 500 yards of total offense against a stunt-heavy defense is a nice start.
The Tide defense was the pleasant surprise of the day, given the recent season-ending injury to ILB Dylan Moses. True freshmen Shane Lee and Christian Harris played admirably, combining for 12 tackles on the day (Lee made a huge 4th down stop in the first quarter), while the secondary showed that it could be the strength of the team forcing three turnovers.
Special teams was consistently inconsistent as ever, but freshman kicker/punter Will Reichard is still young and there’s plenty of time to improve. All in all, it was another stifling season opener for the Tide. Next up is New Mexico State.
2. Georgia
If you were able to watch any of the Georgia-Vandy game last night, you might’ve noticed one of two things: 1) There was conservatively 60,000 UGA fans in a 40,000-seat stadium, 2) the team’s performance was definitively Georgia.
30 points were scored by the offense. The defense allowed two field goals from a clearly inferior Commodore team. Rodrigo Blankenship (in his ninth year of eligibility) made all three of his field goal attempts. And while all of this may seem rote, it’s important to understand that this is how the Bulldog faithful like it.
Running back D’Andre Swift (still the most apt name in the conference) rushed for nearly 150 of the squad’s 323 yards and quarterback Jake Fromm did what Jake Fromm needed to do (15 of 23 for 156 yards) with an entirely new receiving corps with which to work. Fromm’s the kind of guy who will show up when it’s absolutely necessary. This is his lot.
Still, there’s nothing that the East division showed this past weekend that indicated any team but the Bulldogs will be in Atlanta in December. The Dawgs host Murray State this Saturday.
SEC football has two elite teams. Might there be another?