Alabama Football: Final Sugar Bowl thoughts and prediction

Less than 24 hours before Alabama Football’s 17th Sugar Bowl, let’s take a final look at what to expect. There’s no teaser here. Details below explain why, but the conclusion is a big Alabama Crimson Tide victory.

Alabama football message boards indicate an uptick in the belief the game will not be close. That could be because some of us have a habit of growing optimism late in every game week. More logically, there are indications the 2022 Alabama Football team will play its best game against Kansas State.

In talking about the game earlier this week Nick Saban was very specific the team is his most focused non-Playoff bowl team. His explanation was a strong predictor of the game’s outcome.

"This has been the most enjoyable bowl practice experience we have ever had — I’ve ever had …one of the things is — all the blinking lights are gone. You know what I mean by blinking lights? When you look at a Christmas tree and one light is blinking, and that’s all you look at, is the blinking light? You don’t see the beauty of all the rest of it …… you have guys on your team sometimes that — I call them energy vampires — you use all your energy on these guys, trying to get them to do what they’re supposed to do. Those are the kind of guys that don’t end up playing in bowl games …"

Without any “energy vampires” Alabama Football is a decidedly better team than the Kansas State Wildcats. KSU is a good team, and one that if the Crimson Tide were to go through the motions in the Sugar Bowl, could pull off an upset. But it will not.

The are only two ways the game will be a single-digit margin. One would be some bizarre plays giving KSU a big turnover margin. The other would be if Nick Saban decides to pump the brakes hard on the Tide offense in favor of giving Jalen Milroe and Ty Simpson plenty of snaps.

Alabama Football to disappoint mostly pro-KSU Sugar Bowl crowd

Otherwise, my prediction is Alabama Football will win by three touchdowns. That prediction is up from my earlier optimism of an Alabama Crimson Tide win of 34-17.

While talking about the enjoyable game preparation, Nick Saban also said all of the exiting transfer players were given the option to play in the Sugar Bowl. None chose that opportunity.