Ho-hum, another 13-1 season, Southeastern Conference title, and College Football Playoff national championship appearance for Nick Saban and the Alabama Crimson Tide. Alabama being nearly perfect has become a common occurrence in college football, which explains how the Crimson Tide have come to dominate the CFP since its inception.
Alabama will have a big challenge on Monday, though, as it takes on SEC rival Georgia in an attempt to win its second straight national championship. It’s never easy to beat a fellow elite team like Georgia once, but to do so twice in the span of just over a month is very difficult.
Let’s take a look at Alabama’s season so far with an eye toward how the Crimson Tide have performed against the college football spreads.
Crimson Tide Not Great Against the Spread
Based on the college football odds, the Crimson Tide were merely good at covering the spread as the favored team in 2021 instead of their usual dominance. Alabama, which wasn’t favored in every game and favored by double-digits in each contest except for the SEC Championship, went just 8-6 against the spread and 3-3 ATS in the last six games of the season.
Of course, in their most important games of the season — the SEC Championship Game and the Cotton Bowl — the Crimson Tide easily covered, blowing out Georgia and shutting down Cincinnati’s explosive offense. Also, Alabama’s less-than-impressive ATS record could be in part due to how betting shops like the BetUS Sportsbook might give the team too much credit when they set their lines.
The Crimson Tide are a great team and have ridiculous talent all over the place, but even mid-tier SEC schools are also pretty good and it’s not so easy to consistently cover multiple-score spreads.
Alabama Tough in Close Games
Not surprisingly, the Crimson Tide did very well in one-score games this season and actually played more tight contests than you might expect. Alabama went 4-1 in games decided by seven points or less, with the only loss (and only setback of the season) being a 41-38 defeat at Texas A&M.
That blip aside, Alabama is a great bet in close games because it is such a well-balanced team. The Tide is third in scoring offense in the country (41.4 points per game) and 13th in scoring defense (19.2 points per game) and have this year’s Heisman Trophy winner under center in Bryce Young.
When it comes down to it, it’s going to be tough to stop Alabama from putting up big point totals. And, even if a team is able to do that, it’s very hard to score on the Tide. That combination makes for an extremely formidable team in general, but especially so in close games.
Unders Common for Alabama
With Young and a deep and talented offense, you might think that Alabama was an over-the-total darling this season. But, you’d think wrong. The over was just 7-7 in Tide games in 2021 and the point total didn’t seem to follow much of a pattern.
If you’re betting online, it’s important to remember that the Crimson Tide routinely have enormous point total figures for their games because of how many points their offense typically scores. But, even for the best of offenses, it’s not really reasonable to carry an over on its own, especially when said team has a really good defense as well.
So, Alabama isn’t the most reliable team if you’re looking for an easy take-it-and-forget-it over. The 27-6 Cotton Bowl win over Cincinnati was a game in which the over never had a chance as Alabama smothered Desmond Ridder and Jerome Ford, holding a top-10 offense to 218 total yards from scrimmage and two field goals. If Alabama can do that against the Bearcats, it can help the under win in any game against any opponent.
However, it might be useful to note that Alabama, historically, has gone over all five times it has played in the CFP national championship game. That could just be a weird statistical quirk or a sign that the Tide find another offensive gear when a national title is on the line.
