What a time to be an Alabama Football and an Alabama Basketball fan!
After last season’s success and a strong start to the new season, it appears Nate Oats is building a program that will challenge for championships every season. Based on the recent wins over two Final Four participants from last season, Gonzaga and Houston, Nate Oats has a team that believes it can beat any opponent. For the first time in a very long time, more than a small minority of Crimson Tide roundball fans agree.
Alabama Basketball cannot be compared to Alabama Football. That is not a slam on Tide hoops. A solid argument can be made, no other college football program can be compared to the Alabama Crimson Tide.
Taking a moment for reflection, Alabama fans can look back at what has transpired, beginning in the 2008 season, and be re-amazed. Not a single one of us could have dreamed what would follow in the 2008-2021 seasons. In the 14 seasons, 175 wins, including 104 SEC wins; eight SEC Championships, and six National Championships.
Scour every college football, historical record book available, and only one legitimate conclusion can be reached. Alabama Football, under Nick Saban, has had the greatest run of success in college football history.
For the record, Yale has the most National Championships across the entire span of college football history. The Bulldogs won their first (shared title) in 1874 after a 3-0 season. The last Yale National Championship was in 1927 and all 18 titles were awarded retroactively. For too many reasons to mention, the Yale record does not come close to matching the Alabama Crimson Tide.
And the Tide legacy continues to grow. A back-to-back SEC Championship, followed by a back-to-back Heisman Awards is the prelude to potentially another Crimson Tide, back-to-back National Championships. Back-to-back, consensus National Championships are the rarest, team achievement in college football.
Alabama Football against the College Football World
Going back to the start of the Poll-Era in 1936, only six times have college football programs won consecutive and unshared National Championships. Going back to the 1957 season, it has happened only twice. Nebraska did it in the 1994 and 1995 seasons. The Alabama Crimson Tide matched the feat in 2011 and 2012.
The other four times a program won back-to-back, unshared National Championships were: Minnesota (1940 and 1941); Army (1944 and 1945); Notre Dame (1946 and 1947) and Oklahoma (1955 and 1956).
Can the Crimson Tide become the first program to achieve the feat twice? In a season, where youth, inexperience and injury should have stymied the Tide’s chances, it has more than survived. Nick Saban’s 2021 team is the favorite to win it all again, much to the dismay of the rest of the college football world.
Whether the Crimson Tide fulfills those expectations remains to be seen. Injuries to key players on offense and defense (John Metchie III and Josh Jobe) will result in a less formidable Crimson Tide in the Playoffs. Then there is the fact (if it comes to it) that beating a top team twice in a season is an added challenge.
The definitive source on College Football National Championships is available here.
However the 2021 season ends, with or without a National Championship, Nick Saban has proven the nay-sayers wrong again. The Alabama Football dominance of college football marches on.