Sunday Hangover: Auburn

If it isn't bad enough that the Tide loses to Auburn in Bryant-Denny, they lose the Iron Bowl to a team they pretty much dominated most of the game. Like the trip to Baton Rouge, Alabama should have won this game.

As the adage goes, when you get a team down, you have to bury them when you have chances. And the Tide had multiple chances to bury Auburn in the first half. An opportunistic poke of the football after a huge pass play that ended in a touchback, a dropped pass that would have been a touchdown, a downright whiff by the right tackle that led to a sack of and fumble by McElroy, these are the plays that kill you -- the missed opportunities.

If the Tide converts a touchdown on any of those three trips to the red zone, Auburn gets the loss they deserve.

There's plenty of blame to be given to the defense though with the two huge pass plays for touchdowns. The glaring weakness of this team in the pre-season was the secondary with only having one front line guy back (Barron) from last year's team in the nickel package. And Barron, the veteran and one hell of a player usually, had a bad game on Friday. Saban is a consummate secondary coach, but when you trot out redshirt freshman, true freshmen, and players with little SEC experience in the secondary, you will get burned. And it goes back to giving up big plays.

South Carolina thumped the Tide in Columbia. There's no doubt there. Like the big pass plays on a green secondary in the South Carolina game, those also hurt the good guys versus the obnoxious tigers of LSU and Auburn.

9-3 is disappointing, especially with the result of the Iron Bowl. I didn't have high hopes for another national championship this season. Those thoughts were for Kool-Aid drinkers and unanalytic sports journalists. However, the losses to LSU and Auburn smart. They are painful markers on this season even though this Tide squad is a strong one. Not a great team but a strong one.

So I'll sit here and wait for what bowl and matchup awaits the Tide, what decisions will influence the personnel and chemistry for next season's squad, what recruits sign with the Tide in February, and what the A-Game shows about the potential of next year's team along with the interesting quarterback competition between McCarron and Sims.