Alabama Football: Goodbye and thank you to 2021 season
By Ronald Evans
For Alabama football fans, disappointment fades but appreciation can last forever. As Crimson Tide fans, we don’t get much practice at accepting and moving on from a loss. It is especially hard when that loss in a National Championship game.
Many across the world of college football think our normal arrogance needs the body blows of losses to maintain a proper perspective. No doubt we Crimson Tide football fans are blessed beyond reason by the greatest college football program of all time.
Consistent with that blessing should be an awareness a season not ending in a National Championship can still have been a success. Rather than defining the 2021 season by two losses, including one on the biggest stage, define it by its achievements.
Given the massive rebuild required for the Alabama Crimson Tide offense, that side of the ball did well in 2021. It is unfair to measure 2021 or any other season against the Crimson Tide’s 2020 offense. The 2020 group was loaded with a level of explosive talent that cannot be frequently matched.
On the other side of the ball, the 2021 Crimson Tide defense was better than it was in the 2020 season. The ’21 defense should not be measured by the final game, having to play with two inexperienced cornerbacks because of injuries.
Speaking of injuries, few teams could have sustained so many key injuries and made it to a National Championship game. Injury luck did not favor the Crimson Tide in 2021. Perhaps the outcome would have been different Monday night, if not for the injury to Jameson Williams. We will never know. We do know less experienced players on offense and defense failed to make key plays in the game.
Focusing on those mistakes is the wrong perspective. For one, excuses for coming up short are beneath the Alabama Football program. Secondly, the young men who could have done better against Georgia will move forward, learning from their mistakes and renewing their efforts to improve.
After the game, Nick Saban stated one game does not define Bryce Young and Will Anderson Jr. Of course that is true, but it still needed to be said. The same is true for Kool-Aid McKinstry, Khyree Jackson and the Crimson Tide receivers who failed to make key catches in the game.
What Nick Saban accomplished with the 2021 team has been described as the best coaching performance in his career. Getting the team back to another National Championship game was truly remarkable.
Searching for the correct perspective, check out this tweet from Phidarian Mathis.
https://twitter.com/PhidarianMathis/status/1481066040595566598
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The 2022 season beckons, filled with opportunities to compete and achieve, to the Alabama Football standard. The greatest dynasty in college football history moves on.