The board makes Alabama a heavy home favorite and has the total in the mid-50s, which assumes Alabama's September offense shows up instead of its October one. Picks aren't posted yet. This is a week-early preview, and the read on the Tide depends on how much of the Georgia and Tennessee slump carries over.
The Citadel41-0
The Aggies' problem is who's left to catch the ball. Wideouts T. Bussey and M. Williams are both done for the season, running back T. Riden Jr. has been out since August, and guard B. Ivy was ruled out for the year after the Missouri game. A. Bethel-Roman, another receiver, is questionable for personal reasons. That's a lot of missing pieces for an offense that has already struggled to score away from College Station. KJ Edwards running for 116 yards against The Citadel is encouraging, but the A&M passing game still hasn't shown it can move the ball against an SEC defense on the road.
Alabama has its own receiver issue. R. Coleman-Williams is out with a knee injury and has no return timeline, and tight end J. Ford is still dealing with the arm injury that had him questionable for Tennessee. Against a defense that just played a team that never threatened, the Tide don't need to be great. They need to be clean. Ten flags and giveaways lost the Tennessee game, and those are fixable problems, which is exactly why this week matters so much in Tuscaloosa.
The way this goes for Alabama: they run it, avoid penalties, and let a banged-up A&M receiver room try to keep up. The way it goes for A&M: the Tide's offensive problems turn out to be real, Morrow and Edwards grind out the clock, and a home crowd that hasn't seen 3 straight losses in over a decade starts to get nervous. Of those 2 scripts, the first is a lot more likely.