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SEC Football Power Rankings, Week 13: Tua’s injury puts damper on season

By Dante Pryor

TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA - NOVEMBER 09: Tua Tagovailoa #13 of the Alabama Crimson Tide looks to pass during the second half against the LSU Tigers in the game at Bryant-Denny Stadium on November 09, 2019 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Photo by Todd Kirkland/Getty Images)
TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA - NOVEMBER 09: Tua Tagovailoa #13 of the Alabama Crimson Tide looks to pass during the second half against the LSU Tigers in the game at Bryant-Denny Stadium on November 09, 2019 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Photo by Todd Kirkland/Getty Images) /
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It was an interesting weekend of SEC football. Have we seen the last of Tua? Does LSU have enough defense to win a national title?

Tua Tagovailoa’s career-threatening injury overshadowed the game action in the SEC this week. Officially, Tua sustained a dislocated hip and wall fracture while scrambling in the Crimson Tide’s game against Mississippi State.

Here at headquarters we were reluctant to issue a statement concerning the injury and our opinion of what happened, but Coach Fulmer, Coach Croom, and Coach Dooley all got together to convince us that we should speak our mind on what happened.

So this is the take of the power rankings team:

While it’s a tragedy what happened to Tua Tagovailoa against Mississippi State, no one is to blame for what happened. It’s football, not ballet. Players sustain injuries. There’s a meta-discussion about value, and who should and shouldn’t play based on that value, but no one on the team is from Vanderbilt.

In other words, we aren’t that smart.

Part of the culture head coach Nick Saban has instilled in Tuscaloosa is that every game matters. On the surface, the Tide win against Mississippi State with Mac Jones or even Taulia Tagovailoa — Tua’s brother. That isn’t the point at Alabama; every game is of equal importance, and you put your best out there all the time.

Team doctors cleared Tua to play, and both Tua and his parents wanted him to play. The injuries he sustained against the Bulldogs were unrelated to the high ankle sprain he sustained before the LSU game, so it wasn’t as if he re-injured the ankle; which was the primary reason people said he should not play against Mississippi State in the first place.

So, don’t blame Saban, or the doctors, or his parents or even Tua himself. This injury could have happened the first game of the season; it could have happened against LSU. In football, these sorts of things happen. We know they do, and we’ve seen worse.

Here are your power rankings for Week 13.

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