No. 15 Alabama suffered the second loss of its season on Saturday, falling to then-No. 11 Tennessee 24-17.
The loss jeopardizes the Crimson Tide’s playoff hopes, as the team likely needs to win out to have any chance of grabbing a spot in the 12-team bracket.
One category that contributed to Alabama’s loss on Saturday was penalties. The Crimson Tide was called on 15 penalties for 115 yards, the most penalties and penalty yards it has been called for in a game this season.
Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer said after the game that mental errors caused all the penalties.
“It’s a little bit of everything, right?” DeBoer said. “It’s false starts, just getting off to a rough start there, then there’s a couple more intermixed in there. There’s just some mental mistakes.”
Perhaps the most costly penalty Alabama committed happened with a little over eight minutes left in the fourth quarter.
Up 17-14, the Crimson Tide forced Tennessee to third down and 5 at midfield. The defense forced an incomplete pass that would have brought on the Tennessee punting unit, but Alabama was called for a defensive holding penalty that gave Tennessee an automatic first down.
The 10-yard penalty made a glaring difference in the game, as Tennesse went on to throw a 16-yard touchdown to end the drive and take a 21-17 lead.
“We can’t kill ourselves like that,” DeBoer said. “There’s times that you see that we’re locked in, but we’ve got to be better. We’ve got to be better.”
Earlier in the game, another Alabama penalty also led to a Tennessee touchdown.
Halfway through the third quarter, Alabama was leading 7-0. Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava threw an incomplete pass on second and goal that would have put the Volunteers at third and goal from the 9-yard line.
On the play, Alabama linebacker Jihaad Campbell was called for a defensive pass interference penalty in the end zone. The penalty gave Tennessee an automatic first down on the 2-yard line, where the Volunteers scored a rushing touchdown on the next play to tie the game at 7-7.
DeBoer expressed his frustration over the multiple times penalties have put Alabama in tough positions this season.
“We just can’t get over the hump, and it’s going to put you in some situations where you’ve got your backs to the wall,” DeBoer said.
In Alabama’s two losses, penalties have loomed large.
Two weeks ago against Vanderbilt, penalties on defense helped extend Vanderbilt drives that ended in Commodore touchdowns, and penalties on offense stalled out Crimson Tide drives.
“You can’t win a football game when you have mistakes like we had out there and all the penalties,” DeBoer said.
Alabama will look to keep its hopes to make the College Football Playoff alive this weekend as the Crimson Tide return home to take on No. 21 Missouri.
