‘Prepare like we’ve never won': Alabama football’s CFP mindset vs Oklahoma
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Kalen DeBoer and Alabama football players know what’s at stake when they return to Norman for the first round of the College Football Playoff. A chance to prove the Crimson Tide can beat Oklahoma. An opportunity for revenge.
Against the Sooners, who have won the last two meetings, Alabama could choose to only focus on the past. That’s not the approach, though.
Instead, Alabama is coming into this one with a clean slate.
It’s not about avenging a 24-21 defeat in November, or getting payback for how the Sooners disrespected the Script A in Bryant-Denny Stadium. The mindset is survive and advance, to prove that the Crimson Tide belongs in the playoff that it missed in 2024 — in large part due to a 24-3 blowout loss to Brent Venables’ club.
Team captains Ty Simpson and Deontae Lawson spoke with reporters on Monday, Dec. 15 after practice in preparation for Friday’s game, and the messages being sent in the locker room echo a new beginning for Alabama.
“It’s a new season, right? 0-0. Nobody’s won. Nobody’s lost,” Simpson said. He doesn’t want his team worrying about what happened last year, or the year before.”
He wants his teammates to control what they can control, from the attitude they carry into Oklahoma Memorial Stadium to the way they play.
“We’re going to prepare like we’ve never won and perform like we’ve never lost,” Simpson continued.
In addition to the 0-0 mentality, Lawson’s primary point of emphasis to players is to be the “best version of yourself.”
“You’ve got to be your best when your best is needed, and it’s playoff season, a whole new season. Just got to go on and up,” Lawson said.
In a win-or-go home scenario for the first time at the helm of Alabama — his second ever as a head coach in the CFP — DeBoer is encouraging the Crimson Tide to remember its mindset “in the moment” and how it responds knowing the majority of the home crowd won’t be in Norman. Granted, that factor hasn’t affected Alabama too much based on its 4-1 away record.
“I think that’s where we’ve executed better in the critical situations. That was kind of a theme going into the offseason,” DeBoer said.
At Oklahoma, where there will still be a sea of crimson, but no “Dixieland Delight” ringing out, Alabama isn’t chasing retaliation or validation — just the one thing it didn’t have a year ago.
A chance to keep playing.
Emilee Smarr covers Alabama basketball and Crimson Tide athletics for The Tuscaloosa News. She can be reached via email at esmarr@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Alabama football preparing like it ‘never won’ for CFP vs Oklahoma
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