College Football’s 5th Quarter: 5 National Championship Game narratives

3. Nick Saban’s third championship trip in a row

So much for parity in College Football but no one ever said this system was fair. The Alabama Crimson Tide are playing in their third consecutive College Football Playoff National Championship game in a row.

The Crimson Tide have top-five rated recruiting classes every season, a beautiful campus and athletic facilities, decades of history and tradition dating back to Bear Bryant, Gene Stallings and Nick Saban, and success in the big game. The Tide have won four titles in the past seven years and Saban loves the spotlight. He’s done it with a revolving door of assistant coaches, many who have moved on to head coaching jobs. 

Many will complain about the All-SEC matchup (and we’ll cover that narrative later) but it hasn’t mattered what region a team is from, Bama has defeated them and won the national title. Since the College Football Playoff, Saban’s program has beaten the Washington Huskies, the Clemson Tigers and the Michigan State Spartans. That’s three different regions all facing the same fate. Now they take on SEC foe the Georgia Bulldogs.

Regarding three-peats, the Florida State Seminoles did this same trio under legend Bobby Bowden. The ‘Noles finished the back-to-back-to-back title game run from 1998-2000 with a 1-2 record. The Seminoles lost to the Tennessee Volunteers in the 1999 Fiesta Bowl, then beat the Virginia Tech Hokies in the 2000 Sugar Bowl, before losing to the Oklahoma Sooners in the 2001 Orange Bowl. 

If you’re tired of Saban winning, beat him. Sure Alabama loses almost every season, and usually in a major upset like the “Kick-Six” or to Ole Miss or Texas A&M, but they always come back and win the SEC, unless they don’t have to like now in 2017.