Alabama opens the season in Tallahassee with lofty expectations and major pressure on second-year head coach Kalen DeBoer. Missing the College Football Playoff for the second consecutive season will be deemed unacceptable in the eyes of the power brokers in Tuscaloosa, and with such a difficult SEC slate, that means starting the year with a win over the program that the Crimson Tide edged out for the fourth spot in the 2023 CFP.
After finishing 13-1 in 2023, Mike Norvell’s Seminoles are reeling from a 2-10 season, but as a program that relies heavily on the transfer portal… Well, results may vary. The Tide will be heavily favored in Week 1, but hard to know what to expect from Florida State. With a new-look roster and tweaks on the coaching staff, the Noles can cause problems in the season opener.
Thomas Castellanos will try his best Diego Pavia impression against Alabama
For much of Nick Saban’s tenure, there was a narrative that dual-threat quarterbacks were his kryptonite. While that was quite the massive overstatement, in a small sample, scramblers have given Alabama’s defense major issues under Kane Wommack.
Diego Pavia pulled a major upset with a highly efficient game through the air and 19 carries for 48 yards. Then, when Oklahoma stunned the Tide to ultimately keep them out of the CFP, Jackson Arnold rushed 24 times for 134 yards. After hiring Gus Malzahn as offensive coordinator, Florida State brought Thomas Castellanos to Tuscaloosa to run.
Under Bill O’Brien at Boston College last season, Castellanos’s rushing efficiency fell off a cliff, but in 2023, he ran for 1,113 yards and 13 touchdowns. That year, Castellanos ranked 13th in the country in EPA/rush at 0.35, a narrowly better efficiency than Jalen Milroe produced on the ground in 2024. Malzahn will bring that version of the undersized QB back out and test if Wommack has worked out the kinks in Year 2.
Alabama will feel the loss of last year’s leading tackler, Jihaad Campbell, but with Deontae Lawson and Justin Jefferson both back at off-ball linebacker, Wommack will need to lean on their experience to keep Castellanos in check on designed runs and as a scrambler. Malzahn loves to use motion, jet-sweeps, and every type of window dressing in the run game, so if Alabama’s second and third-level defenders aren’t disciplined in Week 1, Castellanos could give them an upset scare.
Florida State made major additions at wide receiver with 6-foot-6 USC transfer Duce Robinson and Tennessee's former gadget-play weapon Squirrel White, but with Domani Jackson and Zabien Brown both back for another season in Tuscaloosa and Castellanos' limitations as a passer, the ground game will be the focus.