Alabama could dodge one of Tennessee’s biggest defensive threats in the annual rivalry

Are you paying close attention? It may be the heart of the offseason in college football, but every little bit of news that trickles out matters. On Friday morning, the Tennessee Volunteers got some bad news on their big transfer portal pickup. Edge rusher Chaz Coleman is dealing with some personal matters. He "has yet to report to Knoxville for summer workouts." There is a chance he may not come.

On3's Pete Nakos was the one to provide intel on the situation surrounding Coleman at Tennessee.

Coleman was supposed to follow his former Penn State Nittany Lions defensive coordinator Jim Knowles over to Knoxville. While we should hope Coleman can get the help that he needs, if he does not show up to campus, this is really good for Kalen DeBoer's chances of getting Alabama back into the College Football Playoff. Conversely, it puts Josh Heupel even more behind the eight ball at UTK...

This may not be a trap game for DeBoer to fall into, but the news does make the road date a bit easier.

Alabama may have caught a break ahead of the Third Saturday in October

When looking at Alabama's upcoming schedule for this season, the Third Saturday in October rivalry at Tennessee falls directly in between their two hardest games of the campaign. Alabama will host Georgia at Bryant-Denny on Oct. 10 before travelling to Knoxville to take on Tennessee on Oct. 17. A week later, another playoff team from a year ago comes to town in the form of Texas A&M on Oct. 24.

Although the LSU road date on Nov. 7 does look challenging, the Bayou Bengals do have a new head coach in Lane Kiffin. Plus, they have only made the playoff once, and that was right before COVID... By taking a good, hard look at Alabama's schedule, the Crimson Tide can actually afford home losses to Georgia and Texas A&M, and still make the playoff, so long as they do not drop another game this fall.

While the chances of the splitting the UGA/A&M pair are strong, and taking both of them is certainly possible, the last thing DeBoer needs is for a rivalry game on the road to be even more of a doozy than it already is. Tennessee is not the same team it was two years ago. Quarterback play will likely be an issue for the Vols this fall. If Coleman does play for them, then it makes their defense even worse...

Read more: Alabama football's 5 biggest individual threats on the 2026 schedule

Right now, Alabama has as favorable of a schedule as it could hope for. The Crimson Tide draw East Carolina, Florida State, and Chattanooga in the non-conference. All three of those games will be at home. While the Crimson Tide do have five road games in SEC play, Kentucky has a new head coach, and so does LSU. Mississippi State, Tennessee, and Vanderbilt all have to break in new quarterbacks.

Overall, the chances of this team winning 10-plus games seems quite high. We know that Georgia has had its issues with Alabama under Kirby Smart. As for Texas A&M, it is a team with a ton of talent that often underperforms. Regardless, those are two likely playoff teams coming out of the SEC anyway. By seeing Tennessee's fading stock plummet even more, it makes this rivalry game quite winnable.

Nothing is won and lost on paper, but Alabama will need to take advantage of its favorable schedule.

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