Bro I was a straight up Alabama & Nick Saban hater during this era. Looking back on it is nostalgic. The current generation doesn't appreciate how dominate Alabama was back in the day. I'd re-live it anyway.
Thats usually how the “villain” dynasties work. Same with the Warriors & Patriots. we all hated them during their peak but looking back they really were essential
These days hard schedules include a lot of weak non-conference games which is why I personally always put Alabama's schedule in 1977-8 as the toughest ever. They scheduled Nebraska, USC, Louisville, and Miami (Fl) in 1977 and Nebraska, Missouri, USC, and Washington in 1978 going 6-2 in the non-conference and undefeated in conference. Bear Bryant was a badass. He'd play anyone.
I can go back as far as Gene Stallings 1992. Alabama's 13-0 season... finishing there schedule playing 6 conference opponents in a row. Alabama @ Tennessee [sat] Ole Miss @ Alabama [sat] Alabama @ LSU [sat] Alabama @ Mississippi State [sat] Alabama N Auburn [Thurs] Florida @ Alabama [sat] Alabama N Miami, the BCS Sugar Bowl 1993 National Championship 34-13.Alabama defense showed up big time.
Which makes me excited to see Bamas schedule going forward with two P4 non conference teams every year moving forward now. Sucks Florida State fell off right before it starts
@@callmen4 why? Bama is done. All the recruits are leaving. And all the big ones from now on will pass on alabama with ab a 90% rate. I knew we were doomed when they announced this God awful coach who needs to go back to Washington. I remember the day Saban was signed and I remember the day he pulled the plug on the program :( I still am thankful I was around to see bama go from the mike schula disaster go alllll the way to the heights of bamas multi nattys and 0 losing seasons in his what 15 or so years? What a fucking ride man, what a ride. Thank you nick!! Greatest coach to ever do it. Bar NONE. Regardless of what sport or what level. The greatest.
Alabama's 2010 schedule was insane. They had to play 6 teams that were all coming off a bye week. That's never happened before and the NCAA implemented a rule change so it could never happen again. It was just a freak scheduling situation but it was brutal. Bama went 10-3 that year.
Pretty good, but 2010 SJSU has you by a mile. They were a trash team, but their schedule single handily discredits the entire existence of SOS as metric. Oh you played 6 teams coming off a bye week? They played 5 top 25 teams on the road including 2 top 10 teams and played 2 more top 10 teams on top of that. Per the woeful geniuses at ESPN, SJSU ranked #61 in SOS in 2010 despite playing 7 top 25 teams; 50% of the top 10 offensive teams and the top 3 defensive teams in the nation. Its a little hard to trust yall when you complain about G5 teams not playing tough schedules and then a G5 team plays this and gets ZERO CREDIT WHATSOEVER. And please talk about talent. Oh did you play 5 NFL starting QBs, including 3 All Pros and 2 Super Bowl QBs? This doesnt even include the toughest offensive team they played. Imagine your 8TH HARDEST GAME being against Derek Carr.....
The 2016 year with Derrick Henry running into the endzone time after time makes more sense as time goes on. Saban is the goat but damn it helps to have him on your team
Henry was 2015. And yes it helps to have great players but as I always point out how many times do teams not only not live up to their talent but massively underperform it? That 3 year Alabama stretch was remarkable because Alabama did it with completely different offenses. 2014 was a short passing game heavy offense to Amari Cooper with loads of bubble screens and the like with Blake Sims as the QB. In 2015 they went run heavy with Derrick Henry. In 2016-2017 they switched again to a QB run heavy team with Jalen Hurts until they then handed the ball over to Tua and became an incredibly passing heavy team.
2016 was Bo Scarbrough. I remember right after watching the first Alabama-Clemson championship game, one of my friends we watched the game with (For full context, Byrnes Hall at Clemson was where we watched the game. I was a student there at the time, and I was already a fan.) showed me a picture of the next man up, Bo Scarborough, looking even bigger and more jacked than Derrick Henry, and my reaction was something like "goddammit!" Carlos Watkins ended up breaking his leg in the next year's rematch, so he didn't get to finish the game.
As a georgia fan that was just getting into college football in HS at this time. I had no idea Ole Miss was terrorizing Alambama like this through these runs lmao makes sense.
No matter what we did they just kept coming at us😂 we didn’t know what they were doing,I don’t even think ole miss knew what they were doing lol but it was working
@under-a-rock5444 let's hope so. Unfortunately between NIL and the portal it will be very hard to repeat. Loyalty and discipline had already suffered badly.
this three year stretch covered my senior year of hs, and my freshman & sophomore years at bama. i’ll never forget any of these three teams, and how much they had to earn their accomplishments. the nfl wont ever forget either
Great episode, as always! Thank you This one reminded me of a story that might be worth retelling if you want to look at it. In 2000, Bob Stoops 2nd year at Oklahoma, it wasn’t so much the overall strength of schedule, but they went on a heckuva run within the season. We, fans, back then called it Red October. October games that year just happened to be multiples of 7…no idea why that sticks in my mind, but games were 10/7 10/14 10/21 10/28. We played 4 straight games against highly ranked teams…Texas, Nebraska, Kansas State and I think it was Texas AM. Anyway…OU was just getting good again, after a crap run in the late 90’s and no one really knew how good they’d be(not ranked to start season to a Natty at the end) and the run in Red October was the key to it.
The difference is they had to play these games because they were in division lol. Sankey chose to send georgia on the road to play those tough games, VS texas gettin 6 of the bottom 7 on their schedule
Great video! Sometimes we don’t fully understand what these young men went through and how it made them legendary before they faced any adversity at the next level of football and after football.
Added to this is the fact Alabama plays by far the most teams coming off byes, especially around that time. In 2010 they played 6 straight teams coming off a bye. And if you look at penalty data Alabama was a crazy outlier with opposing teams rarely being called for holding in that time period
@@shane87smith A study from 2012-2017 on holding penalty calls showed that Alabama opponents got one holding call per 260 plays, which was 2.5x the national average. They were by far the most extreme outlier in the country. The most successful teams tend to have the fewest penalties called against their opponents each year
Colorado in 1990 played the toughest schedule I remember and won the title. Out of conference they played #2 in the sec Tennessee. The southwest conference champs 10-1 Texas. The PAC 10 champs UCLA and #3 in the big 10 Illinois. They also had to play regular season against Oklahoma and Nebraska ECT. I've never seen a team attempt an out of conference schedule like that since.
I’m an Alabama fan. Be even with GA’s tough schedule.. they are still in the playoffs. They did good this season even considering all their injured players throughout the season.
Honestly I feel bad for Bama and patriots fans who grew up during those 2 dynasties. If you were a kid you probably just think that it's normal for your favorite team to win it all every other year. Lots of Bama fans in their mid 20s who are gonna be crushed by reality.
@@kevinbond8966 grew up an Alabama fan, but all my other sports teams have sucked forever so I'm kinda used to it, but it sucks cause Alabama football is definitely the team I care about 10x more than any other
@@andrewe165Same. I grew up a Oakland raiders fan (because my dad) and Philadelphia eagles fan (because my brother) and come from a state with no professional sports teams and where our college teams are and have always been terrible. I sorta became an Alabama fan on my own after the tornado hit Tuscaloosa in 2011 (long story) and the Katherine Webb incident at the 2013 natty (also very long story) but didn’t start following the team seriously until the 2014 iron bowl and the rest is history. First time in my life too that I’d actually been able to root for a team that actually won games and was dominate. Definitely feels bittersweet to see the dynasty slowly fizzle out over the past few seasons. We all knew it would happen one day. Unfortunately can’t stay at the top forever.
This is also the time when the infamous signs of "We Want Bama" began to show up so often. Everyone knew that the only way to prove you were the best team in the nation was to beat Alabama, as it would solidify your team as the legit best.
@@Ksupreme_, no no...answer his question... A far better retort would be that SMU struggled with Clemson, who got destroyed by Georgia who lost to Alabama. The Tide's problem this year was inconsistent play. When playing well, they are impressive... The trouble is they don't always play well.
Saban was a beast even his last year was solid. He retired not because he was past his prime and was done with coaching cause he wanted too be. remember Saban was Coach in the SEC's prime era 2010=2017 ( give or take)
Bama played 2 OOC away games vs a Top 25 team since 2000. Oklahoma and Penn St. Sagan is the goat but he knew how much easier it would be to schedule teams at a “neutral” site down the road in Atlanta.
This is why Georgia will never be Alabama. For years Bama was playing top 10 LSU, top 10 A&M, top 15 Auburn. UGA would play one or two ranked teams all season. One hard year and they lose 2 and were lucky to not lose 4
2021: #10 sagarin sos (#3 espn), 14-1 national champs, 3-1 vs top 10 teams. 2022: #12 sagarin sos (#8 espn), 15-0 national champs, sec champs, 4-0 vs top 10 teams can’t find 2023 sagarin numbers, but probably around #20 sos, + top 5 sor, 13-1 record, ~3-1 vs top 10 teams 2024: #4 sagarin sos (#1 espn), 11-2 sec champs, 3-2 vs top 10 teams sec west is a gauntlet don’t get me wrong, but uga isn’t playing cupcakes and have always made it a point to schedule a top team out of conference to supplement the sec east schedule. not to mention uga also played auburn in their cross division game every year as well (ofc bama played utk and they were good some of those years)
I've deduced that the biggest problem in college football today is... there's no acceptable universal standard of how the SOS is measured in college football. The way ESPN does it (most believe they cook the books for the SEC anyways) isn't the same way the Sagarin Ratings does it or the way the College Football Network does it, and so on... The problem with some systems are that they have a mathematical formula they apply across all of college football. It would be fine if all of the FBS were equal, but it's not. For example... College Football Network has Michigan as the #1 SOS following the completion of the regular season. They played 7-5 Arkansas State, mathematically, on paper that looks good for Michigan. However, if Michigan played 6-6 Arkansas, their SOS would have taken a hit. But objectively, which one would have been a tougher match up? Michigan also played 6-6 Fresno State. If they played 5-7 Wisconsin, that would lower their SOS in some eyes. Arkansas & Arkansas State shouldn't be a 1 to 1 comparison. Neither should Michigan & Central Michigan. That's the flaw in a standard formula being applied across all of college football. Last year, the Sagarin had Oregon over Washington in their final rankings. How is that possible when they beat them twice head to head? It happens when you give Liberty the same value as Texas in a major bowl game. Oregon had a larger margin of victory in the Fiesta Bowl compared to Washington's win over Texas. Washington also played an extra game that they lost, which hurt them mathematically. Then, when you realized the fact that Kentucky alone produced twice as many NFL players than the entire Mountain West Conference in this last NFL draft. You realized there's a BIG difference. The entire G5 had 18 players drafted (Liberty was oddly completely absent, Texas had 11 drafted), and 11 FCS players were drafted in that same year. The G5 and FCS are way more comparable than the power conferences. The top 2 teams in the draft produced more NFL talent than the entire G5. The top 5 schools in comparison to the 5 group of 5 conferences are 54 to 18. I could go deeper, but this is already long.
1:25 I know that the schedule says "@ Texas" but that game is neutral site every year, so is it really going 'to texas' if both teams are going to each other every time?
It's all because college football continues to lose the one thing that makes its popularity unique which is its Regional appeal. Now it is all about making super teams and it has completely lost what makes it special
No they haven’t these are trash takes Georgia has the number 2 seed and Alabama and ole miss were highly ranked until both lost their SECOND game against trash teams, Alabama in a route. The “harder” schedule wasn’t the reason they got booted from the playoff. They were.
If that’s the case then why is Alabama in 11th ahead of 10-2 Miami????? SOS is completely taken into consideration, people are just upset that Bama loses to 3 teams 2 of them relatively bad in vandy and OU and gets locked out of the playoffs even while being ranked 11th. Sounds like they shoulda just won their “easy” games since they beat Georgia
Maybe next time Bama should have avoided losing convincingly to an unranked, rebuilding Oklahoma team at the end of the year. Though imo the less ranking politics the better, get the NCAA to ban teams from scheduling non D1 FBS teams and then we can stop crying about SoS as much.
The old FSU schedules during the early Bobby Bowden years were brutal. That's back when they advertised themselves as "Anytime. Anywhere." They'd be going @Nebraska, vs Pitt (they were a lot better back then), and @LSU all in one year.
The difference is that in between those games they would play a bunch of small teams. The season you mentioned, 1980, they played three ranked opponents. Bama in 2016 played ten ranked opponents.
The problem is, the committee gives credit and rank teams higher just by virtue of playing a team like Alabama. So, if a team doesn’t get completely destroyed by them, then they’re actually likely to move up in the polls; or it won’t affect them. So, part of the reason the schedule appears so difficult every year, is because every team that they play gets an inflated ranking.
Roll Tide! Thanks for the great video, seeing positive or even neutral coverage of our team (outside the fan base) is really rare. So I’m biased when I say I loved it. That said, all your videos are really well done
Look at Ohio State 2006. Yeah, they crapped the bed against Florida but look at their schedule leading up to that. That was the THIRD time that season they had played the number 2 team in the country. Texas, tcun, and Florida. A gauntlet. Then our Heisman winning qb gained 20 pounds and Ted Ginn got hurt on the opening kickoff (which he took for a touchdown). What a season.
@@Scuba4Steve Only when the refs have an emotional and/or financial incentive in letting it happen. Which, over the last 15 years, is constantly against Alabama, to the amazement of everyone who hates them.
@@ThatFalloutGod the 2022 alabama vs tenn game was one of the most obvious fixed games i have ever seen . i even have a video about it . the refs made it so obvious they were told bama can not win. there was a drive bama was up in the by a touchdown , if bama got the stop and ball back could go up by two scores with 4 mins left. well on that tenn drive . they whistled a fumble recovery play dead early for "forward progress" ...smh every fumble u are furtherst progressed never heard or seen that again and shown a replay only once and was zoomed so you coulnt see he was down before letting got of ball . quickly moved on to next play . bad penaltys after tenn got stopped on a make or punt 3rd down and on a 4th down attempt. then tenn went for it on 4&1 and bama stuffed it and this time they called penalty on tenn for false start whic benefited tenn by getting 4&6 redo. all to end this drive on a bama interception that was called back by yet another horrible PA call which flag was thrown by ref on other side of field after the interception for another penalty completely . which they said there was no penalty for that call, cause thats not why they threw the flag , then they proceeded to call the horrible PA call that not only was a horrible a call but no ref in the area threw a flag, tenn player wasnt even looking for a flag he was looking down upset cause he knew bama made a play . that drive ended with a tenn touchdown to tie the game . THIS WAS ALL ON THE SAME DRIVE!!!!! PEOPLE STILL CANT SEE IT !!!
1997 Michigan had the hardest schedule in recent history 7/12 games were ranked matchups including #8 Colorado, at #3 Penn states, #4 Ohio State, and #8 Washington state in the rose bowl We went undefeated and still people say Nebraska deserved the natty despite them nearly losing to Missouri
Funny coincidence, that Washington State team UM faced in the 1998 Rose Bowl was coached by Mike Price - 5 years later, he would lead the Cougs back to the Rose Bowl, and would sign a massive contract extension to stay in Pullman for years to come. Despite his new contract, he would shock everybody by announcing that following the Rose Bowl, he would be leaving to become the new head coach at Alabama. In May of 2003, following a promising spring practice, news broke that Mike Price had been spotted at a strip club in Pensacola, FL, allegedly leaving with multiple strippers to continue the party in his hotel room. It quickly came to light that an, "unknown woman" had made charges to Price's tab totally around $1,000. This controversy followed a string of reports that Price had been reprimanded by the University for repeatedly being caught drinking into the early morning hours at local "college" bars in Tuscaloosa. The University would eventually decide to rescind the contract offered to Price, making him one of the only coaches in CFB to ever be fired before coaching a single game. It's impossible to know how things would have turned out, but it's certainly plausible to assume that with reasonable success, Alabama may have never been in search of a new coach prior to the 2007 season - and Nick Saban may have never set foot in Tuscaloosa.
Uh I mean Tom Osbourne and Nebraska; Bobby bowden FSU are up there as well. Like you wanna talk about playing quality opponents - go back and look at Bama's seasons a lot of these teams were overrated af. Compare this to FSU (showing rankings when they played them/final rankings): 1990 - #9/#3 Miami, #5/#19 Auburn, #6/#13 Florida, #7/#10 Penn State 1991 - #19/#23 BYU, #3/#6 Michigan, #10/#11 Syracuse, #2/#1 Miami, #5/#8 Florida, #9/#12 A&M 1992 - #15/unranked Clemson, #16/#15 NC State, #2/#3 Miami, Unranked/#19 UNC, #16/unranked GT, unranked/#25 Wake Forest, #23/unranked Virginia, #6/#11 Florida, #11/#14 Nebraska 1993 - #17/#22 Clemson, #13/#19 UNC. #3/#15 Miami, #2/#2 Notre Dame, #7/#4 Florida, #2/#3 Nebraska 1994 - Unranked/#15 Virginia, #13/unranked UNC, #13/#6 Miami, #25/#15 NC State, #4/#7 Florida, #4/#7 Florida.
The idea in CFB that wins are thought of as big based on the team being good at the end of the season isn't the way to go. It should be based on how good the team was thought of when they played them
With the new playoff system it will skew what is “the hardest schedule of all time” but Oregon is approaching it if they make it through the gauntlet in the playoffs
As a Michigan fan, I went into the Rose Bowl absolutely hating Alabama. I came away from that game impressed with both their talent and their sportsmanship. Their fans were super respectful and their players gave us our toughest challenge all year. Looking forward to seeing them again this year!
Didn't Alabama start 3 or 4 different QBs over the course of that 2014-16 stretch as well? Specifically, the guys I'm thinking about are Sims, Coker and Hurts + I think Blake Barnett was also around for that sort of transitional period after McCarron went pro.
But they only won a single national championship in that span. Also, sos is a little stupid when looking at rankings at the time of the game. The rankings are xompletely subjective, a team might look good and be ranked 4 weeks into the season but then be shown as frauds later on. I understand no metric is perfect, but you need to be fair. Not to mention the fact that these were almost all divisional games where the teams were propped up by being in the same division as Bama. Its still impressive, but it needs context.
What this period really shows is how overrated the SEC consistently was. They had about 5-6 teams every season that got ranked in the top 15 that didnt even fininish top 20 by the end of the season. But if a SEC team the championship then they would claim that somehow justified the ridiculous rankings..... South Carolina got ranked top 10 by preseason (finished 7-6), A&m beat them, so then A&m was clearly a top 10 team (they actually finsihed 8-5), well then AUburn beat A&M, so they are clearly a top 10 team (finsihed 7-6), but then Arkansas beat AUburn and A&M so clearly they are top 10 (finished 7-6). Bama beats all these teams - wel clearly they are #1 for beating 4 top 10 teams, when in reality they beat 0 ranked teams. This process is why people hate the SEC. And the fact that this isnt recognized is really the problem.
Bro I was a straight up Alabama & Nick Saban hater during this era. Looking back on it is nostalgic. The current generation doesn't appreciate how dominate Alabama was back in the day. I'd re-live it anyway.
Thats usually how the “villain” dynasties work. Same with the Warriors & Patriots. we all hated them during their peak but looking back they really were essential
These days hard schedules include a lot of weak non-conference games which is why I personally always put Alabama's schedule in 1977-8 as the toughest ever. They scheduled Nebraska, USC, Louisville, and Miami (Fl) in 1977 and Nebraska, Missouri, USC, and Washington in 1978 going 6-2 in the non-conference and undefeated in conference. Bear Bryant was a badass. He'd play anyone.
I can go back as far as Gene Stallings 1992. Alabama's 13-0 season... finishing there schedule playing 6 conference opponents in a row.
Alabama @ Tennessee [sat]
Ole Miss @ Alabama [sat]
Alabama @ LSU [sat]
Alabama @ Mississippi State [sat]
Alabama N Auburn [Thurs]
Florida @ Alabama [sat]
Alabama N Miami,
the BCS Sugar Bowl 1993 National Championship 34-13.Alabama defense showed up big time.
Which makes me excited to see Bamas schedule going forward with two P4 non conference teams every year moving forward now. Sucks Florida State fell off right before it starts
@@callmen4 why? Bama is done. All the recruits are leaving. And all the big ones from now on will pass on alabama with ab a 90% rate. I knew we were doomed when they announced this God awful coach who needs to go back to Washington. I remember the day Saban was signed and I remember the day he pulled the plug on the program :( I still am thankful I was around to see bama go from the mike schula disaster go alllll the way to the heights of bamas multi nattys and 0 losing seasons in his what 15 or so years? What a fucking ride man, what a ride. Thank you nick!! Greatest coach to ever do it. Bar NONE. Regardless of what sport or what level. The greatest.
This is my favorite comment ever😭😭😭😭they don’t even know it’s satire mf ended his sentence with “he’d play anyone”😭😭😭fucking comedy
Alabama's 2010 schedule was insane. They had to play 6 teams that were all coming off a bye week. That's never happened before and the NCAA implemented a rule change so it could never happen again. It was just a freak scheduling situation but it was brutal. Bama went 10-3 that year.
They should of beat Auburn horrible way to lose being up almost 24 points
Pretty good, but 2010 SJSU has you by a mile. They were a trash team, but their schedule single handily discredits the entire existence of SOS as metric. Oh you played 6 teams coming off a bye week? They played 5 top 25 teams on the road including 2 top 10 teams and played 2 more top 10 teams on top of that.
Per the woeful geniuses at ESPN, SJSU ranked #61 in SOS in 2010 despite playing 7 top 25 teams; 50% of the top 10 offensive teams and the top 3 defensive teams in the nation. Its a little hard to trust yall when you complain about G5 teams not playing tough schedules and then a G5 team plays this and gets ZERO CREDIT WHATSOEVER. And please talk about talent.
Oh did you play 5 NFL starting QBs, including 3 All Pros and 2 Super Bowl QBs? This doesnt even include the toughest offensive team they played. Imagine your 8TH HARDEST GAME being against Derek Carr.....
To a bama fan you just have to say “oh, that was the Blake sims year, the Jake Coker year, and the first Jalen Hurts year”
All had there massive ups and downs from a QB play.
YOU DONT KNOW HOW GOOD JAKE COKER WAS
💯💯💯@@sammartin4476
Alabama in the 2010s will go down as the best to ever do it.
The 2016 year with Derrick Henry running into the endzone time after time makes more sense as time goes on. Saban is the goat but damn it helps to have him on your team
Henry was 2015. And yes it helps to have great players but as I always point out how many times do teams not only not live up to their talent but massively underperform it?
That 3 year Alabama stretch was remarkable because Alabama did it with completely different offenses. 2014 was a short passing game heavy offense to Amari Cooper with loads of bubble screens and the like with Blake Sims as the QB. In 2015 they went run heavy with Derrick Henry. In 2016-2017 they switched again to a QB run heavy team with Jalen Hurts until they then handed the ball over to Tua and became an incredibly passing heavy team.
i wish we could get generational backs like him again instead of letting our qb be the generational back😭
That was Jalen Hurts…
2014 and 2015 was Henry but 16 was hurts
2016 was Bo Scarbrough. I remember right after watching the first Alabama-Clemson championship game, one of my friends we watched the game with (For full context, Byrnes Hall at Clemson was where we watched the game. I was a student there at the time, and I was already a fan.) showed me a picture of the next man up, Bo Scarborough, looking even bigger and more jacked than Derrick Henry, and my reaction was something like "goddammit!"
Carlos Watkins ended up breaking his leg in the next year's rematch, so he didn't get to finish the game.
As a georgia fan that was just getting into college football in HS at this time. I had no idea Ole Miss was terrorizing Alambama like this through these runs lmao makes sense.
No matter what we did they just kept coming at us😂 we didn’t know what they were doing,I don’t even think ole miss knew what they were doing lol but it was working
@@loganthrift11 Well, they were cheating. We all know that now. That 2014 game has since been vacated by Ole Miss.
@@horatiocarrillo2176woah , please explain, this is the first time i’m hearing about this
@@DeVonteShearer-e1i Pretty sure it was jusr illegal recruiting and paying players and lying about it. Miss state had something to do with it aswell.
@@DeVonteShearer-e1i yeah it was recruiting violations. Paying players Ncaa doesn’t view it as a win anymore but we all know what happened
It was amazing to experience in real time but sadly we'll never see it happen again. RTR!! Thank you Saban for everything.
They said that after The Bear died.
It will happen again. Sooner rather than later.
@under-a-rock5444 let's hope so. Unfortunately between NIL and the portal it will be very hard to repeat. Loyalty and discipline had already suffered badly.
@@freedomunderground81 True.
Amplify that by the example of many fickle coaches and you got a recipe for disaster.
this three year stretch covered my senior year of hs, and my freshman & sophomore years at bama. i’ll never forget any of these three teams, and how much they had to earn their accomplishments. the nfl wont ever forget either
Great episode, as always! Thank you
This one reminded me of a story that might be worth retelling if you want to look at it. In 2000, Bob Stoops 2nd year at Oklahoma, it wasn’t so much the overall strength of schedule, but they went on a heckuva run within the season. We, fans, back then called it Red October. October games that year just happened to be multiples of 7…no idea why that sticks in my mind, but games were 10/7 10/14 10/21 10/28.
We played 4 straight games against highly ranked teams…Texas, Nebraska, Kansas State and I think it was Texas AM.
Anyway…OU was just getting good again, after a crap run in the late 90’s and no one really knew how good they’d be(not ranked to start season to a Natty at the end) and the run in Red October was the key to it.
Meanwhile Georgia gets 1 year of a hard schedule and Kirby is crying about it the entire season
Jesus loves you have a blessed day
Kirby was apart of that Bama team too you Jackass. Stating a fact isn't crying. Enjoy your bowl game.
The difference is they had to play these games because they were in division lol. Sankey chose to send georgia on the road to play those tough games, VS texas gettin 6 of the bottom 7 on their schedule
@@samm3639 At least Georgia gets them all at home next year.
@@gabecoombs3021also bama has to play 4 straight teams that are coming off of a bye week next season. Sankey's schedules suck lol
Clear example of why those bama teams should always be remembered as the greatest most dominant teams of all time
Great video! Sometimes we don’t fully understand what these young men went through and how it made them legendary before they faced any adversity at the next level of football and after football.
9:25 Rent-a-players may be the best thing I've heard to describe modern CFB. I love that
What a time to be a bama fan
Roll tide
Thank You for This!
Added to this is the fact Alabama plays by far the most teams coming off byes, especially around that time. In 2010 they played 6 straight teams coming off a bye. And if you look at penalty data Alabama was a crazy outlier with opposing teams rarely being called for holding in that time period
it's been said, alabama has never lost a game. the refs are always to blame
@@shane87smith A study from 2012-2017 on holding penalty calls showed that Alabama opponents got one holding call per 260 plays, which was 2.5x the national average. They were by far the most extreme outlier in the country. The most successful teams tend to have the fewest penalties called against their opponents each year
Colorado in 1990 played the toughest schedule I remember and won the title. Out of conference they played #2 in the sec Tennessee. The southwest conference champs 10-1 Texas. The PAC 10 champs UCLA and #3 in the big 10 Illinois. They also had to play regular season against Oklahoma and Nebraska ECT. I've never seen a team attempt an out of conference schedule like that since.
I’m an Alabama fan. Be even with GA’s tough schedule.. they are still in the playoffs. They did good this season even considering all their injured players throughout the season.
Yeah, they've played as many top 10's in the last for years and to a record of 52-4.
Yeah but they ended up losing when playing good teams .. uga was not good this year
My new favorite football channel
OH MY DAYS. The freaking sea shanty at the beginning goes so hard bro.
I wish Alabama could have this 2016 team back with Ryan williams
Looking back on it after the year we had… I took Nick’s and Alabama run for granted😭
Honestly I feel bad for Bama and patriots fans who grew up during those 2 dynasties. If you were a kid you probably just think that it's normal for your favorite team to win it all every other year. Lots of Bama fans in their mid 20s who are gonna be crushed by reality.
@@kevinbond8966 grew up an Alabama fan, but all my other sports teams have sucked forever so I'm kinda used to it, but it sucks cause Alabama football is definitely the team I care about 10x more than any other
@@kevinbond896627 and going through it now smh
Ole Miss alum here. Nick’s Bama is the greatest dynasty BAR NONE!!
@@andrewe165Same. I grew up a Oakland raiders fan (because my dad) and Philadelphia eagles fan (because my brother) and come from a state with no professional sports teams and where our college teams are and have always been terrible. I sorta became an Alabama fan on my own after the tornado hit Tuscaloosa in 2011 (long story) and the Katherine Webb incident at the 2013 natty (also very long story) but didn’t start following the team seriously until the 2014 iron bowl and the rest is history. First time in my life too that I’d actually been able to root for a team that actually won games and was dominate. Definitely feels bittersweet to see the dynasty slowly fizzle out over the past few seasons. We all knew it would happen one day. Unfortunately can’t stay at the top forever.
2010 Alabama played 6 SEC teams that had an open date before playing Bama. 2024 and 2025 4 SEC teams have open date before playing Bama.
You should do a breakdown of 2021 raiders with all the odds they faced that year and what they accomplished, i think it would be a great video
This is also the time when the infamous signs of "We Want Bama" began to show up so often. Everyone knew that the only way to prove you were the best team in the nation was to beat Alabama, as it would solidify your team as the legit best.
that 2015 bama team was my all time favorite Nick Saban team
if SMU had Bama's schedule they wouldn't make a bowl game
Bama lost to Vandy and Oklahoma 😭😭 Who SMU would beat
@@seahawk_nation1275 Vandy could beat SMU
@@Ksupreme_ your aware they lost to Georgia State right?
@@seahawk_nation1275 you’re aware we’re talking about SMU right?
@@Ksupreme_, no no...answer his question...
A far better retort would be that SMU struggled with Clemson, who got destroyed by Georgia who lost to Alabama.
The Tide's problem this year was inconsistent play. When playing well, they are impressive...
The trouble is they don't always play well.
Saban was a beast even his last year was solid. He retired not because he was past his prime and was done with coaching cause he wanted too be. remember Saban was Coach in the SEC's prime era 2010=2017 ( give or take)
Bama played 2 OOC away games vs a Top 25 team since 2000. Oklahoma and Penn St. Sagan is the goat but he knew how much easier it would be to schedule teams at a “neutral” site down the road in Atlanta.
As a Auburn fan we have the most tuff schedule every year
Faxx
Kirby was Alabama’s defensive coordinator those years.
new isaac punts video 🔥🔥🔥🔥keep up the good work
This is why Georgia will never be Alabama. For years Bama was playing top 10 LSU, top 10 A&M, top 15 Auburn. UGA would play one or two ranked teams all season. One hard year and they lose 2 and were lucky to not lose 4
With nil and transfer portal I don’t think there will ever be such a run like this Nick saban Alabama teams
Georgia was also playing top 15 auburn are you ret@rded lol
#11 SOS in 2022 and went 15-0 with a +402 point difference
2021: #10 sagarin sos (#3 espn), 14-1 national champs, 3-1 vs top 10 teams.
2022: #12 sagarin sos (#8 espn), 15-0 national champs, sec champs, 4-0 vs top 10 teams
can’t find 2023 sagarin numbers, but probably around #20 sos, + top 5 sor, 13-1 record, ~3-1 vs top 10 teams
2024: #4 sagarin sos (#1 espn), 11-2 sec champs, 3-2 vs top 10 teams
sec west is a gauntlet don’t get me wrong, but uga isn’t playing cupcakes and have always made it a point to schedule a top team out of conference to supplement the sec east schedule. not to mention uga also played auburn in their cross division game every year as well (ofc bama played utk and they were good some of those years)
You realize no one argues that
I've deduced that the biggest problem in college football today is... there's no acceptable universal standard of how the SOS is measured in college football.
The way ESPN does it (most believe they cook the books for the SEC anyways) isn't the same way the Sagarin Ratings does it or the way the College Football Network does it, and so on...
The problem with some systems are that they have a mathematical formula they apply across all of college football. It would be fine if all of the FBS were equal, but it's not.
For example... College Football Network has Michigan as the #1 SOS following the completion of the regular season. They played 7-5 Arkansas State, mathematically, on paper that looks good for Michigan. However, if Michigan played 6-6 Arkansas, their SOS would have taken a hit. But objectively, which one would have been a tougher match up?
Michigan also played 6-6 Fresno State. If they played 5-7 Wisconsin, that would lower their SOS in some eyes. Arkansas & Arkansas State shouldn't be a 1 to 1 comparison. Neither should Michigan & Central Michigan. That's the flaw in a standard formula being applied across all of college football.
Last year, the Sagarin had Oregon over Washington in their final rankings. How is that possible when they beat them twice head to head? It happens when you give Liberty the same value as Texas in a major bowl game. Oregon had a larger margin of victory in the Fiesta Bowl compared to Washington's win over Texas. Washington also played an extra game that they lost, which hurt them mathematically.
Then, when you realized the fact that Kentucky alone produced twice as many NFL players than the entire Mountain West Conference in this last NFL draft. You realized there's a BIG difference. The entire G5 had 18 players drafted (Liberty was oddly completely absent, Texas had 11 drafted), and 11 FCS players were drafted in that same year. The G5 and FCS are way more comparable than the power conferences. The top 2 teams in the draft produced more NFL talent than the entire G5. The top 5 schools in comparison to the 5 group of 5 conferences are 54 to 18.
I could go deeper, but this is already long.
Ah 2015 and 2016 my freshman and sophomore years at Alabama
The only football team to get their very own Steely Dan song. 🙂
1:25 I know that the schedule says "@ Texas" but that game is neutral site every year, so is it really going 'to texas' if both teams are going to each other every time?
2011 LSU was more impressive to me because they played two out of conference ranked opponents
It's all because college football continues to lose the one thing that makes its popularity unique which is its Regional appeal. Now it is all about making super teams and it has completely lost what makes it special
It’s a money maker now but it’s going to lose its luster soon
Truth
CFP has completely disincentivized SOS for the sake of every conference other than the SEC
And thats why we love it!
No they haven’t these are trash takes Georgia has the number 2 seed and Alabama and ole miss were highly ranked until both lost their SECOND game against trash teams, Alabama in a route. The “harder” schedule wasn’t the reason they got booted from the playoff. They were.
@@nonot8232 Strength of schedule is an argument when you lose to a few good teams. It isn't an excuse when losing to bad teams
If that’s the case then why is Alabama in 11th ahead of 10-2 Miami????? SOS is completely taken into consideration, people are just upset that Bama loses to 3 teams 2 of them relatively bad in vandy and OU and gets locked out of the playoffs even while being ranked 11th. Sounds like they shoulda just won their “easy” games since they beat Georgia
Maybe next time Bama should have avoided losing convincingly to an unranked, rebuilding Oklahoma team at the end of the year. Though imo the less ranking politics the better, get the NCAA to ban teams from scheduling non D1 FBS teams and then we can stop crying about SoS as much.
The old FSU schedules during the early Bobby Bowden years were brutal. That's back when they advertised themselves as "Anytime. Anywhere." They'd be going @Nebraska, vs Pitt (they were a lot better back then), and @LSU all in one year.
Difference is that they didn't win National Championships.
The difference is that in between those games they would play a bunch of small teams. The season you mentioned, 1980, they played three ranked opponents. Bama in 2016 played ten ranked opponents.
The problem is, the committee gives credit and rank teams higher just by virtue of playing a team like Alabama. So, if a team doesn’t get completely destroyed by them, then they’re actually likely to move up in the polls; or it won’t affect them. So, part of the reason the schedule appears so difficult every year, is because every team that they play gets an inflated ranking.
Roll Tide!
Thanks for the great video, seeing positive or even neutral coverage of our team (outside the fan base) is really rare. So I’m biased when I say I loved it.
That said, all your videos are really well done
The video quality has gotten so much better it’s crazy
Yea my cousin was oartnof that clemson win number 1 yessiirrrrrr got the rings at my auntie crib🤝🏿🤝🏿
Look at Ohio State 2006. Yeah, they crapped the bed against Florida but look at their schedule leading up to that. That was the THIRD time that season they had played the number 2 team in the country. Texas, tcun, and Florida. A gauntlet. Then our Heisman winning qb gained 20 pounds and Ted Ginn got hurt on the opening kickoff (which he took for a touchdown). What a season.
As a Bama fan, I'd struggle to find a single play that's ever angered me more than the blatant pick play by Clemson to "win" the Natty.
It’s legal sometimes lol 🤷🏼♂️
@@Scuba4Steve Only when the refs have an emotional and/or financial incentive in letting it happen.
Which, over the last 15 years, is constantly against Alabama, to the amazement of everyone who hates them.
@@ThatFalloutGod the 2022 alabama vs tenn game was one of the most obvious fixed games i have ever seen . i even have a video about it . the refs made it so obvious they were told bama can not win. there was a drive bama was up in the by a touchdown , if bama got the stop and ball back could go up by two scores with 4 mins left. well on that tenn drive . they whistled a fumble recovery play dead early for "forward progress" ...smh every fumble u are furtherst progressed never heard or seen that again and shown a replay only once and was zoomed so you coulnt see he was down before letting got of ball . quickly moved on to next play . bad penaltys after tenn got stopped on a make or punt 3rd down and on a 4th down attempt. then tenn went for it on 4&1 and bama stuffed it and this time they called penalty on tenn for false start whic benefited tenn by getting 4&6 redo. all to end this drive on a bama interception that was called back by yet another horrible PA call which flag was thrown by ref on other side of field after the interception for another penalty completely . which they said there was no penalty for that call, cause thats not why they threw the flag , then they proceeded to call the horrible PA call that not only was a horrible a call but no ref in the area threw a flag, tenn player wasnt even looking for a flag he was looking down upset cause he knew bama made a play . that drive ended with a tenn touchdown to tie the game . THIS WAS ALL ON THE SAME DRIVE!!!!! PEOPLE STILL CANT SEE IT !!!
SEC people. All they ever do is cry. It’s just a game, and it’s in the past now
Wah
The beginning soundtrack is from sea of thieves
Ok
Craziest thing about this is this is around the time all the SEC/Bama haters started the narrative of “Bama doesn’t play nobody” 😂
LOL I remember that . Back then I was just a fan and even was like what?
TCU mentioned🔥🔥🔥
Fun fact. The media at the time was saying these schedules where easy and there strength of schedule was pitiful. Shout out Joel Klatt
WOOOOO WAZZU MENTIONED
Never disliked your video. I tried to watch seriously
Florida has entered the chat
“But they play a cupcake in November”
You also need to look at how often Bama gets stuck playing teams coming off a Bye week. It’s ridiculous.
I thought that was what he was going to talk about, it literally is the most important metric to determine how tough your opponent will be.
completely forgot that Miss. St was ranked #1 not too long ago
Love that georgia is so good everyone hates us😂 gotta hate the goats
1997 Michigan had the hardest schedule in recent history
7/12 games were ranked matchups including #8 Colorado, at #3 Penn states, #4 Ohio State, and #8 Washington state in the rose bowl
We went undefeated and still people say Nebraska deserved the natty despite them nearly losing to Missouri
Impressive for a 1 year schedule, I don’t think anything holds a candle to these 3 consecutive years though
Was Touchdown Tommy behind center for that season or was he not playing yet?
Funny coincidence, that Washington State team UM faced in the 1998 Rose Bowl was coached by Mike Price - 5 years later, he would lead the Cougs back to the Rose Bowl, and would sign a massive contract extension to stay in Pullman for years to come. Despite his new contract, he would shock everybody by announcing that following the Rose Bowl, he would be leaving to become the new head coach at Alabama.
In May of 2003, following a promising spring practice, news broke that Mike Price had been spotted at a strip club in Pensacola, FL, allegedly leaving with multiple strippers to continue the party in his hotel room. It quickly came to light that an, "unknown woman" had made charges to Price's tab totally around $1,000. This controversy followed a string of reports that Price had been reprimanded by the University for repeatedly being caught drinking into the early morning hours at local "college" bars in Tuscaloosa. The University would eventually decide to rescind the contract offered to Price, making him one of the only coaches in CFB to ever be fired before coaching a single game.
It's impossible to know how things would have turned out, but it's certainly plausible to assume that with reasonable success, Alabama may have never been in search of a new coach prior to the 2007 season - and Nick Saban may have never set foot in Tuscaloosa.
Sounds like Nebraska cheated quite a few teams out of Natty cuz they stole one from Penn State in 94’
@@52flyingbicycles That was Brady's sophomore year, he didn't start playing until his junior year
Auburns 2019 schedule was insane.
The closest to come to this is GA going back to back and almost 3 peat
I mean games in Atlanta might as well be called home games.
Roll Damn Tide
There will never be a coach or team like Alabama and nick saban
People said the same thing about Bryant. It'll happen again.
Uh I mean Tom Osbourne and Nebraska; Bobby bowden FSU are up there as well. Like you wanna talk about playing quality opponents - go back and look at Bama's seasons a lot of these teams were overrated af. Compare this to FSU (showing rankings when they played them/final rankings):
1990 - #9/#3 Miami, #5/#19 Auburn, #6/#13 Florida, #7/#10 Penn State
1991 - #19/#23 BYU, #3/#6 Michigan, #10/#11 Syracuse, #2/#1 Miami, #5/#8 Florida, #9/#12 A&M
1992 - #15/unranked Clemson, #16/#15 NC State, #2/#3 Miami, Unranked/#19 UNC, #16/unranked GT, unranked/#25 Wake Forest, #23/unranked Virginia, #6/#11 Florida, #11/#14 Nebraska
1993 - #17/#22 Clemson, #13/#19 UNC. #3/#15 Miami, #2/#2 Notre Dame, #7/#4 Florida, #2/#3 Nebraska
1994 - Unranked/#15 Virginia, #13/unranked UNC, #13/#6 Miami, #25/#15 NC State, #4/#7 Florida, #4/#7 Florida.
Not that auburn is anyone to talk about now but back then we always had a monster schedule every year
The idea in CFB that wins are thought of as big based on the team being good at the end of the season isn't the way to go. It should be based on how good the team was thought of when they played them
Florida constantly has the hardest schedules..
Imagine how low the SOS would be without inflated rankings and cupcake schedules from the rest of the conference lol
I think this nick saban guy might be good at coaching
With the new playoff system it will skew what is “the hardest schedule of all time” but Oregon is approaching it if they make it through the gauntlet in the playoffs
Now it'll be osu or texas
9:20 I can see that because all the good teams y this haven’t played a good schedule
As a Michigan fan, I went into the Rose Bowl absolutely hating Alabama. I came away from that game impressed with both their talent and their sportsmanship. Their fans were super respectful and their players gave us our toughest challenge all year. Looking forward to seeing them again this year!
At least Kansas beat Northern Illinois in week 2...
Go Irish!
And to think my boys in blue retired this guy. Kinda hilarious ngl
Rare times when SEC isn’t bias
go back and look at these schedules again
"or the SEC gets 10 autobids in the playoffs" like that's pretty much not what we all know is going to happen anyway😂
who is the only team to beat alabama twice 2014-2016
wow the pac 12 seems like a good conference what if they still existed?
Didn't Alabama start 3 or 4 different QBs over the course of that 2014-16 stretch as well? Specifically, the guys I'm thinking about are Sims, Coker and Hurts + I think Blake Barnett was also around for that sort of transitional period after McCarron went pro.
If Oregon makes it all the way this year, they will have beaten more top 10 teams than anyone in history
isn’t there a yt advisory against loudly saying the word top for emphasis or albeit to blast the eardrums of the listener?
Georgia had number 1 SOS
And now this year Alabama’s hardest out of conference game by far was Wisconsin. And they are complaining about strength of schedule 😂
Where are the big 10 fans that are goanna say that today big 10 is harder then back then sec😂😂
Best recruiting classes (paid for) over a decade plus should result in some success.
Check out 2011 Tulsa, randomly hard just not as hard as some of these schedules
You obviously never saw the 2011 LSU schedule
Hate him or love him. Nick saban was the greatest college coach of all time
bama was so good it got to a point where u thought they would be number 1 forever
unpopular take about georgia but if you are playing in your home state in a nuetral game it is not an away game its a home game.
But they only won a single national championship in that span. Also, sos is a little stupid when looking at rankings at the time of the game. The rankings are xompletely subjective, a team might look good and be ranked 4 weeks into the season but then be shown as frauds later on. I understand no metric is perfect, but you need to be fair. Not to mention the fact that these were almost all divisional games where the teams were propped up by being in the same division as Bama. Its still impressive, but it needs context.
What this period really shows is how overrated the SEC consistently was. They had about 5-6 teams every season that got ranked in the top 15 that didnt even fininish top 20 by the end of the season. But if a SEC team the championship then they would claim that somehow justified the ridiculous rankings.....
South Carolina got ranked top 10 by preseason (finished 7-6), A&m beat them, so then A&m was clearly a top 10 team (they actually finsihed 8-5), well then AUburn beat A&M, so they are clearly a top 10 team (finsihed 7-6), but then Arkansas beat AUburn and A&M so clearly they are top 10 (finished 7-6). Bama beats all these teams - wel clearly they are #1 for beating 4 top 10 teams, when in reality they beat 0 ranked teams. This process is why people hate the SEC. And the fact that this isnt recognized is really the problem.
uh oh guess i better subscribe. can't be having 10 SEC teams in the playoff
The logical decision
Was that Jalen Hurts in 2016?
Alabama won the tough games but lost the easy ones this season 😂
Jesus loves you
UGA is SEC Champs after playing the real and consensus #1 toughest schedule in CFB history
If Georgia doesn't even have the toughest schedule this year, how can they have the "real and consensus #1 toughest schedule in CFB history"?
@corners7014 they do.
Bama fans always try to make it about them. It’s aight tho, UGA’s been breaking records left and right…still ain’t done yet 😤.
@@BustaNAugustahope y'all ain't done got plenty of catching up 2 do
@@MoogoogalaWe’re breaking records while Bama’s breaking in their couches during a lesser bowl.
Saban is the goat 🐐
Oh cool finally something to do
They arent the only ones with hard schedules look at ug Osu Michigan Florida Purdue and Oregon.