Tennessee vs. Alabama 2025: The Pre-Preview
It's away so the goalposts are safe, but the cigars are still nervous
Other Pre-Previews: Syracuse, Georgia, Arkansas
A Year Ago
Unlike Georgia, whose fans were disappointed with a “bad” season that included a SEC championship and CFP appearance, Alabama had a legitimate down year in 2024. It was still the kind of year that 75% of college football teams wish they could have: nine wins and a New Year’s bowl game. But by Alabama standards, it was putrid. Not only did the Crimson Tide not win a national or SEC championship, they missed the college football playoffs entirely in the year that the CFP expanded to 12 teams. Think about that—THE Alabama Crimson Tide were not selected for the playoffs for just the third time in the CFP era. But they weren’t just being told they were outside the country’s top four teams, they were being told they were not one of the twelve best teams in America. A tournament that featured Arizona State, SMU, and Indiana(!) did not feature Alabama.
In fact, the Tide lost three regular season games for the first time since 2007, Nick Saban’s first year in Tuscaloosa. They then went on to lose to fellow blue blood Michigan in the Citrus Bowl, finishing at 9-4; again their worst record and the first time to finish a season with fewer than 10 wins since that same 2007 season.
And guys, I don’t think we really enjoyed it enough because Tennessee lost to Arkansas later that same day, but Alabama lost to Vanderbilt. I mean, screw Vandy, but that’s objectively hilarious. Little Peabody on West End had their way with the Bama behemoth. They also lost to SEC newcomer Oklahoma. Oh and in between, there was the matter of losing to Tennessee on the Third Saturday in October. Yes, the Tide beat eventual SEC champion Georgia. But to what end? If you can’t make the playoff, if you can’t win 10 games, if you can’t beat Tennessee, hell if you can’t beat Vandy!, then who cares what games you did win?
So will it be another disappointing year in Kalen DeBoer’s second campaign? Or back to business as usual at the Capstone in 2025?
Personnel
Much like the Georgia preview, we see Alabama is loaded with talent. Maybe not quite as many top-200 guys as the Dawgs have, but there’s still plenty of them. Notably:
Martin, TN’s Ty Simpson at QB. Much of Bama’s season will hinge on whether Simpson is really the star they expect him to be, or just another quarterback. He will be helped tremendously by
Ryan Williams, who used to be 17, returns at WR to make with Miami transfer Isaiah Horton and returning starter Germie Bernard.
An offensive line anchored by All-American Parker Brailsford and All-SEC Kaden Proctor will also be protecting Simpson (again, making his job easier) and opening holes for
Jam Miller and a group of highly-touted RBs.
On defense, where you’d expect Alabama to excel, they probably will. LB Deontae Lawson, who had 11 tackles and a sack against the Vols last year, returns from a season-ending injury he suffered against Oklahoma last season.
Other defensive standouts include DE Qua Russaw and CB Domani Jackson.
Outlook
The JAR rating likes Alabama a good bit. The Tide are the 7th-highest rated team in the model. But due to the schedule difficulty, only six games are identified as sure wins, with five being listed as tossups:
To be fair, most of those tossups are on the edge of being sure wins. Each one hits over 50% in both win probability and in the simulation results, but with just low enough confidence to make the game questionable. The model puts Alabama’s most likely record at 9-3 overall and 5-3 in the SEC:
About one game off of Kelley Ford’s prediction of 10 wins for the Tide:
Which aligns with the SP+ projections ($) as well:
And really that’s what we’re talking about for 2025 Alabama isn’t it—the difference between 9 and 10 wins. As much as we as Vol fans want to believe the Tide is about to fall off a cliff, it’s much more likely that Bama is right back in the playoff hunt this year.
So What?
What exactly does that knowledge mean for the Third Saturday in October? Well, Tennessee-Alabama is one of those five games ID’d as a tossup by the JAR model. But is it really? The Vols haven’t won in Tuscaloosa since 2004. And although Josh Heupel is unbeaten against the Tide in Neyland, being within one score in the 3rd quarter in ‘21 and leading at halftime in ‘23 is as close as he’s come to winning at Bryant-Denny Stadium.
However, there is hope. This isn’t Nick Saban’s club anymore. Any coach should be afforded an acclimation period. Dabo Swinney lost 5 and 6 games his first two years at Clemson before making the Tigers a championship-caliber team. Kirby Smart lost five games in his first year at UGA. Even Saban lost six games his first year at Bama. By comparison, DeBoer losing just 4 games in year one doesn’t seem so bad.
The difference, though, is that none of Swinney, Smart, or Saban took over programs with the amount of elite talent that Alabama still had when DeBoer stepped in. All four of Bama’s losses in ‘24 came to teams with a lower talent composite total. The fact that Alabama beat Georgia proves they could’ve competed at the highest levels; the final record proves that they just didn’t. Kalen DeBoer was handed the keys to a Ferrari and drove it straight into a ditch.
That’s where the hope comes from. Yes, Alabama will still be really good. No, they will not be the juggernaut they were even a few years ago. They won’t lose all of those tossup games on the schedule—but they won’t win them all either. Can Tennessee be one of the two or three teams that ends up on the winning side against the Tide?
Extraneous
Dixieland Delight is a song about Tennessee. Thank you for your attention to this matter.