Alabama Football: Crimson Tide bookends SEC West Titles as divisions come to a close.

When the SEC started divisional play the Alabama Crimson Tide won the inaugural SEC West championship on its way to a National Championship in 1992. On Saturday Alabama Football completed the bookend defeating the Kentucky Wildcats clinching the final SEC West championship. Entering next season, the SEC will eliminate divisional play with Texas and Oklahoma entering the conference. Of the 32 SEC West championships Alabama has won fifteen of the division titles. Between his time at LSU and Alabama, Nick Saban won the SEC West eleven times.

Alabama Football winning the final SEC West championship is a fitting end for the team that dominated the conference over the 32 years of divisional play. As the SEC evolves to the format of the Big 12, ACC, and Pac-12 the change to the non-divisional format should be welcomed with open arms by the Alabama Football team. The best teams in the conference have been Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss, and Tennessee with four of those teams facing the Crimson Tide on a yearly basis.

The arrival of the twelve-team playoff and the conference realignments will end any debate over which conference is the nation’s top conference. By the end of this season, the future SEC team will likely have four to six teams that finish in the top twelve a number that will likely continue for years to come.

Alabama Football: Can the 2023 team resemble the 1992 team?

The 1992 Alabama Football team was led by an incredible defense that allowed only 9.2 points per game. The 2023 Alabama football team is also led by an incredible defense that allows only 18.2 points per game a number that’s equally impressive in the spread offense era of college football. That 1992 Defense was led by two All-American edge rushers in Eric Curry and John Copeland. The 2023 Alabama Football team has its own version of the “Bookends” in Dallas Turner and Chris Braswell who have formed arguably the nation’s top pass rush duo. If the 2023 team is going to have any chance of winning a championship like the 1992 Alabama Football team it will take an incredible effort from the Alabama Defense in potential matchups with high-powered offenses like Washington, Florida State, and Oregon.

Note: Rankings Via College Football Playoff. SEC history via SEC.com