Paul Finebaum emphatic that Alabama 'must get in' College Football Playoff after winning offseason

Going into his second season leading the Alabama Crimson Tide, head coach Kalen DeBoer knows that there are expectations that his team improve on the field. After doing everything right during the offseason, Alabama is set up for success, but they still have to meet those goals.

One person who is setting a very high standard for Alabama is Paul Finebaum. He recently explained on Get Up that winning the offseason was great, but now the Crimson Tide need to win on the field and make it to the College Football Playoff.

“They have won the offseason,” Finebaum said. “They have recruited at an elite level, very similar to what Nick Saban did during his 17-year run. But I think that they have to get to the playoffs. Missing it last year, the first 12-team iteration, with a big blow. This year, they must get in. And quite frankly, I think they’ll make a serious run, too.”

In his first season at Alabama, with a team largely inherited from Nick Saban, Kalen DeBoer led the Crimson Tide to a 9-3 regular season. That included some highs, like beating Georgia, and lows, like losing to Vanderbilt. In the end, Alabama would have ended up just shy of making the Playoff.

Since the first College Football Playoff in 2014, Alabama has made it in the field eight times. That’s the most of any team in Playoff history. Those all came under Nick Saban, though, and they were all in the four-team format. DeBoer made the four-team Playoff himself when he was coaching Washington, but now is the time to get there with Alabama.

This offseason, Alabama was able to dominate in the Transfer Portal simply by retaining its talented stars. The Crimson Tide didn’t lose a single player to the spring window. That had fans excited, and then recruiting kicked up in a major way. The Crimson Tide landed two recent five-star commitments from running back Ezavier Crowell and linebacker Xavier Griffin in June. Then, five-star wide receiver Cederian Morgan and five-star safety Jireh Edwards joined in July.

Paul Finebaum reacts to Alabama’s recruiting surge

Amid the recent surge in recruiting success, Paul Finebaum has praised Kalen DeBoer. After all, it appears he can do no wrong.

“I think at this moment in time. Kalen DeBoer can do no wrong. He is dialing up everything on the recruiting trail. I think some of it, and I know he’s using this to friends and fans alike, is that there is stability in the program. That goes back to not losing anyone in the portal. I really think that helps the momentum. You can say this 1,000 times and fans will shake their heads. But [we] know it’s true, the brand of Alabama remains large. It just goes to show that as great as Nick Saban was, and he was, this program lives on because there is a very strong infrastructure there,” Finebaum said.

“Kalen DeBoer is now able to take advantage of it. Yeah, he lost some players in the first days. His first season, in many ways, was terribly disappointing because of the expectations. He has calmed everything down. He’s got a good staff. He’s got a great GM. He’s getting what he needs. And that, to me, is the biggest surprise because I think a lot of people, including myself, wondered, could Alabama hang in this Texas oil money world that we live in, where it’s hard to keep up with certain programs. But they are, and I think there is a flip side of that, and I feel like you’ll get to it in a minute, but as great as Alabama looks at this particular moment, Auburn looks equally as bad.”