Addressing Alabama’s challenge playing at Tennessee in 2024

Alabama returns to Neyland Stadium this fall for the first time since Tennessee‘s 52-49 win over the Crimson Tide in October 2022.

The game, set for Oct. 19, will be an interesting matchup as both teams are looking to establish new identities this fall. For Alabama, they’ll be looking to navigate the new SEC without longtime head coach Nick Saban while the Vols welcome former five-star recruit Nico Iamaleava to the lineup as the full-time starting quarterback.

BamaOnLine’s Tim Watts recently joined On3’s Andy Staples to discuss Alabama’s upcoming season. He gave Staples a preview of what he expects the Crimson Tide’s highly-anticipated return to Knoxville to look like in October.

“I think Tennessee is always going to be a tough place to play,” Watts told Staples. “They’re going to have Nico, an exciting quarterback. He’s going to bring a different dimension than the other quarterbacks we’ve seen in the past.

“But there’s an uncertainty there. How good is their defense going to be? We know what Josh Heupel is going to do on offense. We know how good Nico has the potential to be, and they’ve been waiting to see it. But that crowd — I don’t think you can sleep on that crowd. I’d say that for several SEC places. LSU, Alabama, Auburn, all those teams are great, and tough to play on the road.”

While the Crimson Tide football team is certainly looking ahead at their restarting a winning streak in Knoxville, Watts looked back on the loss from two years ago. Experiencing that type of atmosphere at Neyland Stadium is always going throw in an added challenege every time Alabama battles their SEC foe.

“I don’t know if they [could have been] a better, more talented, smarter offense,” Watts said. “The team that beat Alabama literally found the two or three plays that worked and just ran them into the ground. Bama couldn’t stop them. I mean, Tennessee did all the right things, pressed all the right buttons.

“They had the breaks they needed fall their way in that game crazy — still one of the craziest games I’ve ever seen. From the all the way through the ending to the wild fumbles, the turnovers, the penalties and stuff.”

2024’s matchup is set for Saturday, Oct. 19 with a kickoff time TBD as of this report. The matchup against the Volunteers kick-starts a tough stretch for the Crimson Tide, who will host preseason No. 11 Missouri and travel to No. 13 LSU in consecutive weeks following the game.