Alabama making rare road trip to face non-Power 5 opponent

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Alabama will play its first road game of the season on Saturday, Sept. 16, in Tampa, Fla., when it takes on the South Florida Bulls at Raymond James Stadium.

The obvious question – outside of how Alabama will look coming off its Week 2 loss to Texas – is why is the Tide playing at South Florida. The simple answer is this is part of a 2-for-1 series with the Bulls that was announced in 2019, meaning Alabama would host USF in Tuscaloosa in 2024 and 2026 but would also play a return game on the Bulls’ home field.

“Our future non-conference schedules are really rounding out quite nicely with the addition of series such as this one with USF,” said Alabama director of athletics Greg Byrne when the series was first announced. “We look forward to the early-season road test against a quality opponent in an NFL stadium.”

The trip to the Sunshine State will be Alabama’s first road game against a non-Power 5 school since 2003 when the Tide traveled to Hawaii and lost to the Rainbow Warriors, 37-29.

Alabama and USF will meet for just the second time in series history and the first time in Tampa when the two teams square off on Saturday afternoon (2:30 p.m. CT on ABC). The Tide won the lone matchup on Aug. 30, 2003, for what was UA’s last home game at Legion Field. 

Alabama head coach Nick Saban has never faced South Florida in his 28-year head coaching career. However, he is 0-2 in his career in Raymond James Stadium, falling to Clemson in the 2016 College Football Playoff National Championship Game and when he was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins, losing to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Oct. 16, 2005.

The Tide has shifted its scheduling focus from neutral-site games to home-and-home series. UA will face the likes of Wisconsin, Florida State, West Virginia, Ohio State, Oklahoma State, Notre Dame, Georgia Tech, Boston College, Arizona, Minnesota and Virginia Tech on the schedule for the next 10-plus years. But USF is Alabama’s only 2-for-1 matchup – for now.

“I think the goal when you try and play home-and-home games is to try to enhance the quality of opponents that you have,” Saban said earlier this week. “So you just can’t go out and say, ‘Hey, let’s play a game,’ and everybody agrees to it. You gotta negotiate your way through to see who you can play and who can’t play. It’s been our goal. 

“Now, this was before conference realignment, so that may have some impact on future – was we want to since we’re not going to play a neutral site game, can we get two quality opponents to be able to play in every season besides the SEC games. And look, it’s not easy to find people that will play you and sometimes you have to give and take a little bit to try to get those games to where we have a quality home schedule and we are planning two teams that are Division-I caliber, decent teams to play. 

“Scheduling is very difficult. We’ve tried to get it where we’re playing two teams, and I think most years we are.”

As mentioned above, Saturday’s game will be played at Raymond James Stadium, home to the Buccaneers of the NFL. That could be an exciting element for the Tide’s players. Alabama also heavily recruits the state of Florida. Playing a team in a market like this makes sense.

“I think anytime you play on the road and you play a quality opponent, which I think these guys have made tremendous improvement in their team and the quality of the players and all that,” Saban said. “I mean, it’s a game that’s gonna be on TV. It’s a good market for our fan base in Central Florida. I think it’s all good. 

“But I think it’s only good if you play good. Image is something that you’ve gotta work to really have in terms of what I talked about before in terms of standard, how you play and the things that you do. So that pride in performance is gonna be important no matter where we play.”

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