No. 1 Alabama makes it look easy against No. 3 LSU in 29-0 win
LSU didn’t have a chance against Alabama.
Alabama showed why it was No. 1 in the first College Football Playoff rankings Tuesday with an easy 29-0 win over LSU. And when we say easy, we mean easy. This was not a struggle in the slightest.
The most dramatic moments for Alabama involved injury scares for Tua Tagovailoa. He got a helmet to the groin area during Alabama’s first drive and had to miss a play after he was tended to by trainers. Alabama was forced to punt for the first time on an opening drive all season.
In the third quarter, Tagovailoa scrambled for a 44-yard touchdown run and limped off the field afterward after apparently tweaking a right knee that’s been bothering him for a while. Tagovailoa went to the injury tent after the TD but returned for Alabama’s next drive.
The second-most concerning thing for Alabama was the kicking game. Extra-point tries failed on two occasions. As Alabama fans know very well, bad kicking games can haunt the Tide at inopportune times. Saturday was not an inopportune time. It’s the sixth time LSU has been shut out since 1996. Alabama is responsible for five of those.
Alabama will face Georgia in December
The win means Alabama has clinched the SEC West. Georgia clinched the East earlier in the day with a 34-17 win over Kentucky. Both teams will have a month to prepare for the SEC championship game. It’ll be a rematch of the national championship game in January — won with a Tagovailoa touchdown pass in overtime — and the first time the teams have met since then. Oh, it’ll probably be for a College Football Playoff spot too.
LSU’s playoff hopes are dashed. The Tigers now have two losses and without the benefit of an SEC title game will end the season at 10-2 at best. That will be good enough for a New Year’s Six bowl game (the Sugar Bowl, perhaps?), but not the playoff.
Give Tua the Heisman
Tagovailoa won’t have any challengers for the Heisman Trophy as long as he stays healthy for the rest of the season. Yeah, he threw his first interception of the season but finished 25-of-42 passing for 295 yards and two touchdowns along with 49 rushing yards and that touchdown. He’s accounted for 30 touchdowns on the best team in college football and had his second-worst completion percentage of the season against LSU. He still completed 60 percent of his passes against the Tigers.
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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports.
Follow @NickBromberg on Twitter
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