3 takeaways from Alabama’s sloppy Iron Bowl win over Auburn

Alabama won its fifth straight Iron Bowl with a 28-14 victory over Auburn on Saturday.

The result kept Alabama’s hopes of reaching the College Football Playoff alive and ended Auburn’s bid for a bowl game. The Crimson Tide won’t be too happy about the performance, but while so many of their teammates struggled during rivalry week, the Tide won’t apologize for winning the football game.

The Crimson Tide simply had to win. They just needed to avoid a second straight loss and make sure last week’s loss in Norman didn’t snowball. To this end, the mission is accomplished.

Alabama’s Kalen DeBoer becomes just the sixth head coach since 1948 to win his first Iron Bowl. Alabama’s five straight wins are the program’s longest streak since winning nine straight from 1973 to 1981.

Here are 3 takeaways from the game.

Effective, but certainly not clean

The Good: Alabama totaled 453 yards of offense, an average of 6 yards per play, posted an 18% explosive play rate and went 12-for-17 on third down.

The Bad: Alabama gave up 7 tackles behind the line of scrimmage and turned the football over four times.

When Alabama didn’t give the ball away unnecessarily, Auburn couldn’t stop the operation. Jalen Milroe threw an interception and the team fumbled four times, losing three of them. Ryan Williams fumbled on the first drive. Milroe fumbled on the first play of a drive late in the second quarter and then fumbled again early in the fourth quarter.

The Alabama defense only gave up 6 points due to turnovers and generated 2 takeaways themselves.

Alabama scored touchdowns on 4 of its other 7 possessions. These drives all contained chunk plays. Milroe managed 256 yards through the air and 104 yards and 3 rushing touchdowns on the ground. Jam Miller ran for another 84 yards. Germie Bernard caught 7 of his 10 targets for 111 yards.

Payton Thorne’s time ends in a familiar way

No one is going to say Payton Thorne didn’t fight for Auburn. He did it. He lost his job as a super-senior and immediately returned to the lineup when Auburn needed to return to him. In Auburn’s recent wins, Thorne threw 8 touchdowns against 2 interceptions. He surpassed 300 yards in the win over Texas A&M.

And he did that again Saturday night, but also threw a game-ending interception with 2:41 left in the fourth quarter while trying to force a ball to Rivaldo Fairweather. Alabama had melted just seven minutes after halftime, only to kick the ball to the Tigers near their own goal line. Thorne got Auburn out near its 30 before throwing up a dangerous ball under duress that was intercepted by Alabama’s Zabien Brown.

With Auburn’s season ending at 5-7, Thorne’s college career is over. He will finish his two years at Auburn with 37 touchdown passes and 19 interceptions. The good was good. The errors were too frequent.

Alabama gets help

Without help, the Crimson Tide would not have been able to make it into the College Football Playoff as a three-loss team.

Miami lost to Syracuse. Ohio State lost an embarrassing game to Michigan. Clemson lost to South Carolina. Chaos has erupted over the past two weeks, and while Alabama has no control over its playoff fate, things might be a little quieter for the Crimson Tide.

We’ll see what happens come championship weekend, but I expect Alabama to be in a better position now than it was on Thursday when the decision was made. The Crimson Tide would like to compare their resume to that of Miami or South Carolina.