Kalen DeBoer’s Alabama is mortal in a way Nick Saban’s Alabama never was

Seconds after quarterback Diego Pavia knelt to secure Vanderbilt’s first win against Alabama since 1984, Nick Saban appeared on the jumbotron at FirstBank Stadium.

“The only place you’re going to play in the SEC where it’s not hard to play is Vanderbilt,” the legendary coach turned ESPN personality said in a segment of his appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” on Sept. 20 . played the clip on a loop, trolling Saban and the program he led to six national championships.

That phrase may have applied to Nick Saban’s Alabama. But this isn’t Nick Saban’s Alabama anymore, and that should be the most concerning part of Saturday’s stunning 40-35 loss for Tide fans. This was not a one-time disruption. It was a welcome back to mortality.

NO WAY#Vandy played this quote from Nick Saban after the Alabama unrest:

“The only place where it’s not hard to play in the SEC is Vanderbilt.” pic.twitter.com/QDfGufSQol

— Billy Derrick (@billyderrick10) October 5, 2024

DeBoer took the Alabama job as The Guy After The Guy, inviting comparisons to the greatest college football coach of all time, and he would always be raked over the coals by fans when his first loss came. But his first defeat was not to be thisa setback that is arguably worse than any loss Saban has suffered with the Tide.

After his first season, this never happened to Saban again. He went 123-4 against unranked teams and at one point won 100 straight. The streak ended in 2021 against a Texas A&M team that started the season ranked No. 6.

This never happened against Vanderbilt, which scored a total of 13 points in four games against Saban’s Alabama teams and scored 40 against DeBoer’s first team.

But Vanderbilt was unable to cruise to a win on Saturday. Alabama didn’t rack up a ridiculous number of turnovers, and Vandy didn’t need an improbable series of events. In the fourth quarter, Vanderbilt’s offensive line pushed Alabama’s defensive front off the ball and opened up running lanes.

That certainly never happened under Saban against such an opponent.

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Alabama’s presence under Saban was often enough to startle opponents into the fetal position. That mental edge always thought it was worth a touchdown or something. But here was Pavia, a former junior college quarterback from New Mexico Military Institute who starred at New Mexico State last year, who wasn’t afraid of the Tide. We’ve seen teams hang around with Bama, only to crumble. Vanderbilt never did that. Future teams won’t be afraid either.

For Alabama fans unfamiliar with DeBoer’s career aside from his ridiculously good win-loss record, a performance like Saturday isn’t actually all that new.

In 2022, DeBoer’s Washington team lost to an Arizona State team that finished 3-9 en route to an 11-2 finish. Last year’s Huskies, playing for the national title, narrowly escaped another 3-9 Arizona State team and needed a fourth down conversion to beat a Washington State team that finished 5-7. DeBoer’s last Fresno State team went 10-3 in 2021, but lost to a .500 Hawaii team. The Bulldogs also lost to bad teams from New Mexico and Nevada the year before.

This just happens to DeBoer teams, for whatever reason. He is 41-10 as an FBS head coach, but he loses some games to bad teams. The thinking was that with such a talent advantage now, he wouldn’t do that in Tuscaloosa.

Yes, Saban’s first Alabama team in 2007 won 7-6 and lost to Louisiana-Monroe, but he took over a program that had gone 6-7 the year before. DeBoer inherited a team that emerged from a College Football Playoff appearance.

As Alabama raced to a 28-0 lead over Georgia last week, we all thought DeBoer might have reached a level of Bama that even Saban couldn’t reach. But then Alabama squandered that lead and only escaped with a win thanks to the heroics of freshmen Ryan Williams and Zabien Brown.

Maybe that second half should have been the lesson. Now Alabama has allowed 67 points in the last six quarters. Now, a CFP offer doesn’t feel like a guarantee with the Tide’s remaining schedule.

DeBoer’s Alabama is going to win big games, just like they did against Georgia. But there will also be games lost that Tide fans aren’t used to losing, and it’s that uncertainty that will now hang over everything. Nothing is certain anymore as it was.

The good news is that Saturday’s chaos didn’t just affect Alabama. Tennessee lost to an unranked Arkansas team, leaving just one undefeated SEC team (Texas). The bad news is that Alabama still has to travel to Tennessee, LSU and Oklahoma to play Missouri and Auburn at home. The margin of error to make the 12-team CFP dropped significantly with this loss: The Crimson Tide’s chances of making the field dropped from 94 percent to 80 percent, according to Austin Mock’s model.

It was natural to expect a bounce back after Saban left. It hasn’t actually happened yet on the recruiting trail, where DeBoer has proven doubters wrong. None of this means Alabama will fade from relevance. There is too much talent and too much culture for that.

But there’s a reason why Saban was the greatest of all time. He’s never overseen anything like Saturday. Walking into almost every game with at least an ounce of doubt is the new normal for Alabama fans. Welcome back to feeling like everyone else.

(Photo: Matthew Maxey/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)