After a much-needed bye week, the month of November is going to be very weird for this Alabama Football team. On paper, it looks like a possible cakewalk for the Tide with upcoming games against an LSU team without their head coach, an Oklahoma team that has underachieved based on early-season hype, and an Auburn team that has struggled offensively for the majority of the season. However, these are the teams that seem to rise up, and all three would love to spoil the Tide's chances at an SEC Championship as well as a shot at this year's playoff.
As much turmoil that has swirled around the LSU program this past week from the firing of Brian Kelly and the removal of Scott Woodward as the Athletic Director after the comments of the governor, it would be hard for this Tigers team to be focused on winning games. However, several times over we have seen teams play better after a coach is fired, so this game may be more dangerous for Alabama than if Brian Kelly were still on the sideline. Not only is this one of the biggest games for LSU, but this team will be playing for pride. They will be playing freely, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see this team play its best game of the season next Saturday night in Tuscaloosa.
The week after, the Oklahoma Sooners will roll into town, and at that point, I am not sure where the Sooners will be. Before the injury to John Mateer's injury, OU was looking like one of the best teams in the country, with Mateer being high on the Heisman list. However, since then, they have lost two of three games and are on the verge of being eliminated from playoff contention if they lose to Tennessee Saturday night. There is a possibility, though, that the Sooners find a way to win at Neyland Saturday night and then have a bye week before heading to Tuscaloosa, still fighting for a playoff birth.
No matter the result of this weekend's game against the Vols, the bye week will give John Mateer more time to get as healthy as he has been since the injury happened. We have seen this Tide defense struggle against the run all season, so if he is healthy, we might be in for another high-blood-pressure game for the home fans. Alabama should have no problems getting up for this game no matter how the Sooners fair in Knoxville with the revenge factor in play, but it will be interesting to see how OU comes into this game mentally as they will either just be playing to spoil a season or will pull all the stops out in hopes of getting a huge win that will keep this team very much alive for thie playoff.
And then of course, there is the Iron Bowl, which has been weird quite a few times over the history of the game in Jordan-Hare Stadium. This is a Tigers team that seemed to be on the verge of firing their coach before the big fourth-quarter comeback to beat Arkansas a week ago. They still have SEC games against Kentucky and Vanderbilt, and Hugh Freeze's job may still be on the line if they lose to the Commodores badly. However, those games go, we know how much Auburn enjoys playing spoiler, and as bad as things have been at times for this team, if they were able to pull the upset win on November 29th, then Freeze will have achieved what he was brought to the Plains to do, and that is beat Alabama.
This is meant more as a cautionary piece, so nothing is overlooked in November. The path may not be as daunting as it was towards the beginning of the season, as all three opponents for this Crimson Tide team have underachieved based on expectations to this point. Coach DeBoer has done a great job of having his guys focused every week, and the team showed a lot of moxy coming back and knocking off South Carolina a week ago. Hopefully, during the off week, the players focus on their health, staying loose, and not paying attention to the media which has fallen back in love with this team again after leaving them for dead following Week one.