Alabama gets Florida State at home on Saturday with a chance to move to 3-0 and settle a little unfinished business at the same time. The Crimson Tide opened last season with an upset loss in Tallahassee, and this meeting offers a clean shot at payback.
Kickoff is set for 2:30 p.m. CT on ABC.
The bigger question isn’t just whether Alabama wins. It’s how it looks while doing it. After a shaky start in the Kentucky game, there are a few things the Tide need to clean up before SEC play tightens the screws.
The first thing Alabama has to show is a better opening act.
Against Kentucky, the final result was a blowout, but it took too long to get there. For the first 30 minutes, Alabama looked disjointed, especially on offense. Turnovers, penalties and general sloppiness kept the Tide from settling in until after halftime.
They recovered and finished strong, but that kind of start can’t become a habit. At some point, a sharper opponent will make the Crimson Tide pay for that sort of slow burn. This one is at home, so there’s no crowd noise excuse early, and Florida State is not supposed to be the kind of team that can drag Alabama into another messy first half.
If the Tide can clean up the first and second quarters, that would say plenty about where this team is headed.
Another major piece is Keelon Russell. Alabama’s sophomore quarterback has already shown why he won the offseason battle, and the upside is obvious. Against East Carolina, he flashed in a big way and showed a ceiling that looks as high as any quarterback Alabama has had.
But Russell is still learning on the job. He barely saw the field as a freshman, so a lot of this is still new to him at the college level. That has shown up in the form of mistakes: putting the ball in danger, fumbling, holding onto it too long while scrambling and making the wrong reads.
He beat Austin Mack for a reason, but the rough edges need to come off quickly. Florida State is a good place to start before the heart of SEC play arrives. If Russell looks more polished on Saturday, that would go a long way toward calming any doubts about whether Alabama picked the right guy.
Then there’s the defense, which may be the most reliable part of the whole operation right now.
Kane Wommack drew plenty of early criticism from Alabama fans when he first arrived, mostly because he wasn’t Nick Saban. The defense had some shaky stretches early in his tenure, but by last season it had become the team’s strength, and that has carried into 2026.
The front has real juice. Southern Cal transfer Devon Thompkins made his presence felt against Kentucky, and Yhonzae Pierre has continued to flash as a pass rusher. Luke Metz, one of the new starting linebackers, even took one back for a pick six against Kentucky, while Caleb Woodson has lived up to expectations since coming over from Virginia Tech.
Behind them, the secondary still looks as strong as advertised thanks to all the returning talent from last season. Put it all together, and Wommack’s group looks capable of being one of the defining units in the country this year.
In Other News...
Alabama's Mike Norvell Near-Miss Looks Even Bigger Now
When Nick Saban announced his retirement in January 2024, Mike Norvell surfaced as a serious name in Alabamas search, with reports indicating he had moved into advanced talks with the Crimson Tides athletic director. In the end, Norvell stayed at Florida State after landing a contract extension, closing what looked at the time like one of the biggest coaching possibilities of the offseason.
Since then, the backdrop in Tallahassee has only grown shakier, with Florida States football fortunes sliding and the programs athletic director recently being fired. For Alabama fans looking back on that search, the near-miss feels more significant now, because the decision to stay put has placed Norvell in a far more uncertain spot than the one he passed up. [Read more 🡒]
Keelon Russell May Have Changed Alabamas Ceiling Faster Than Expected
Keelon Russell gave Alabama a jolt in the comeback win over Florida State, and he did it with the kind of poise that can change how a season feels in a hurry. Down 21-6, the quarterback helped the Crimson Tide score on seven straight possessions, finishing 23 of 30 for 320 yards and three touchdowns while adding 56 rushing yards and another score in the 50-36 victory.
For Alabama, the performance was about more than one flashy afternoon. Russell still described himself as a quarterback in development afterward, which is the part that should make the rest of the sport take notice, because if this is where he is while still growing into the job, the ceiling in Tuscaloosa may have moved up faster than anyone expected. [Read more 🡒]
SEC Power Struggles Keep Reshaping The World Around Alabama
Conference disputes have become a defining backdrop for the sport Alabama lives in, with schools and leagues repeatedly testing just how much control each side really has. LSUs effort to add former NFL training camp players to its roster and the SECs response is only the latest reminder that the ground around college football keeps shifting, whether it is a coach suspension in the Big Ten, Florida States lawsuit against the ACC over media rights or Washingtons sanctions from the old Pac-10.
For Alabama, the bigger point is how often these fights reshape the competitive landscape before anyone plays a game. Texas A&Ms move into the SEC came out of frustration with the Big 12, and the pattern is familiar enough now that each new dispute feels like another sign of a sport still working through who has leverage, who gets heard and what happens when schools decide their conference no longer fits the job they want done. [Read more 🡒]