Happy Monday, everyone. The most important news of the day: It’s officially basketball season! Nate Oats and company will tip off the season tonight against North Dakota.
When is Alabama basketball vs North
Dakota?
Date: Monday, Nov. 3
Start time: 7 p.m. CT
Alabama and North Dakota will tip off at 7 p.m. CT on Monday, marking the first of 14 regular-season home games for the Crimson Tide.
What channel is Alabama basketball vs North Dakota?
Channel: SEC Network+
Streaming for Alabama-North Dakota is available on SEC Network+. The channel will stream three non-conference games for the Crimson Tide this season.
We all remember the pain that the Fighting Hawks were in Grant Nelson’s homecoming trip last season. Fortunately Treysen Eaglestaff has moved on to West Virginia so he won’t be around to drop 40 on the Tide this time. This one shouldn’t be difficult if Alabama plays as it should, but that was the case last season as well.
Dre Kirkpatrick Jr. had a rough weekend.
University of Alabama defensive back Dre Kirkpatrick Jr. was arrested on several charges during the team’s bye weekend.
The UA sophomore from Gadsden was booked into the Tuscaloosa County Jail at noon Saturday.
He is charged with three counts of reckless endangerment, one count of attempting to elude and speeding, according to jail records.
Kirkpatrick was released on $1,500 bond within an hour of his booking.
Details haven’t been released, but it sounds like he was driving like an ass. Kirby is probably already tampering with him as that kind of behavior fits better in Athens.
Auburn canned Hugh Freeze yesterday after scoring three points at home vs a Kentucky defense that came in allowing 34 in SEC play.
Gus Malzahn was the last Auburn coach to beat Alabama, leading the Tigers to a 48-45 win at Auburn in 2019.
Alabama has won five straight against the Tigers.Freeze is one of three full-time head coaches since 1948 to finish a tenure without a win against Auburn, joining Bryan Harsin and Doug Barfield.
When was last Auburn football interim coach in Iron Bowl vs. Alabama?
Cadillac Williams also led Auburn to a loss to Alabama as interim coach in 2022 as did Bill Oliver in 1998.
We’ll worry about Auburn later on, of course. Next up is a LSU that fired the coach last week.
The Bayou Bengals were 4-0 entering their matchup with Ole Miss, which is where things began to go awry. Lane Kiffin and company won that game 24-19, not a death blow to the season, but a sign of things to come.
The next loss came against Vanderbilt. Diego Pavia and the Commodores won 31-24 in Nashville, pushing LSU to the brink of playoff elimination.
Both of the first two losses came on the road. However, the third came in embarrassing fashion inside Tiger Stadium, completely unacceptable by LSU standards.
The Tigers lost that game 49-25 to Texas A&M, prompting the turmoil throughout the athletics department. Like Alabama, LSU had an off week before the trip to Bryant-Denny Stadium.
This LSU team could be dangerous. They didn’t get blown out of any game until last week, and as crazy as it sounds, their playoff hopes aren’t dead. Win out from here and they’ll have three losses with wins over Alabama and Oklahoma. With the ACC now looking firmly like a one-bid league, LSU could very well sneak in with that resume and it would be one hell of a story.
You can bet that the coaching staff is telling them that they still have things to play for as well. This Alabama team doesn’t seem likely to take any opponent lightly considering the battles faced so far, but they certainly can’t afford to.
Speaking of the playoff, here are some Alabama projections.
CBS Sports: No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 5 Georgia/No. 12 Memphis; Cotton Bowl, Dec. 31
Athlon Sports: No. 3 Alabama vs. No. 6 Ole Miss; Sugar Bowl. Jan. 1
ESPN (Kyle Bonagura): No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 5 Oregon; Orange Bowl, Jan. 1
ESPN (Mark Schlabach): No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 5 Georgia; Cotton Bowl, Dec. 31
The Athletic: No. 4 Alabama vs. No. 5 Georgia/No. 12 Memphis
All of the projections have Texas A&M winning the SEC and landing the 2 or 3 seed, which is interesting. If that matchup comes to fruition and it’s apparent that both teams have bye weeks all but locked up, the game becomes virtually meaningless. The SEC title should still mean something, but expansion to 16 teams and disparate schedules have had a dampening effect. Georgia is sitting pretty here, avoiding a tough game in Atlanta then hosting a playoff game where they will be heavily favored to win.
Alex Scarborough has a nice interview with Ty Simpson, who acknowledged that his confidence wasn’t where it needed to be in the season opener.
“To be honest,” Simpson said, “in full disclosure, I didn’t think the belief was quite there yet. It was my first start in a hostile environment, it was my first game, and there were a bunch of new things I didn’t know. I wasn’t really sure how it was going to go.”
He trusted his ability. He’s always been confident in that. But after waiting so long to prove himself, he said, “I made it bigger than it was.”
Doubt crept in.
The thoughts he fought so hard to move on from came rushing back.
He recounted them: “Can I? What took so long? Why didn’t I play last year?'”
Last, Brian Robinson had himself a nice day as RB2 to Christian McCaffrey.
Robinson’s touchdown was the eighth consecutive run called by 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan. Robinson covered the final 33 yards in three consecutive carries.
“It’s awesome,” Shanahan said. “It’s so tempting the whole time. You’re like, ‘Man, can you do it again and get away with it? Maybe we should do a play-action or something off of it. No, screw it. We’ll just keep running it.’ And the guys came through. And that’s one of the most enjoyable drives that you can go on when it’s all run plays.”
Robinson also returned a kickoff for 41 yards, catching the football in the end zone and returning it to the San Francisco 40.
“I thought he played real well, too,” Shanahan said. “Ran the ball really well. Completely flipped me. I went from being extremely angry with him for not taking a touchback to eating my own words and saying ‘Hell of a job getting past that.’ I don’t know where he got to, but he got close to the 50, I believe, so it was a hell of a return and played real well today.”
How does eight consecutive manball running plays for a touchdown sound to you?
That’s about it for today. Have a great week.
Roll Tide.
