Gulf Coast talent still dominating college football

Late Saturday afternoon and into the evening, Mobile athletes took over college football.

Within a few minutes of real time, former Spanish Fort Toro D.J. James made a clutch interception with 50 seconds remaining to win a dramatic 34-31 game for Oregon over UCLA. Because of James’ late heroics, the Ducks remain in the hunt for the college football playoff.

A few minutes later and 2,021 miles away, former Saraland star Velus Jones broke free for a touchdown to tie the game between Tennessee and Alabama, stunning the Bryant-Denny Stadium crowd.

The game was still tied entering the fourth quarter. But in part because of former St. Paul’s star Jalyn Armour-Davis, the Tide pulled away for a 28-point win. Alabama led 38-24 with 11:11 left in the game. Tennessee had the ball in Alabama territory and was still very much in contention of pulling off the upset. That’s when Armour-Davis picked off a Hendon Hooker pass and returned it 44 yards to the Tennessee 18. Five plays later, Alabama was in the end zone again, and the blowout was on.

The big play and return down the right sideline at Bryant-Denny Stadium was reminiscent of when Armour-Davis had the key play to lead St. Paul’s to the 2017 state championship win over Briarwood Christian at Bryant-Denny. That was the year St. Paul’s and UMS-Wright both won state championships, while previously undefeated McGill-Toolen lost to Hoover.

One of the stars from McGill-Toolen that night was receiver Jalen Tolbert, who added to last week’s drama with two touchdowns for the South Alabama Jaguars. That McGill-Toolen team also included future Jaguars Bryan Hill, Trey Simpson and Tre’ Young.

The first touchdown of the night for the Jaguars was scored by former Faith Academy and Spanish Fort wide receiver Jalen Wayne.

The South Alabama roster also includes Hayden Merchant from Fairhope, Keith Gallmon and Jason Brooks from Mobile Christian, Caullin Lacey from Faith Academy, Jamall Hickbottom from Williamson, A.J. Phillips from Chickasaw, Tyler Jernigan from Baldwin County, Diego Guajardo from Daphne, Jayland Whitsett from Vigor, and Carlos Johnson from B.C. Rain and Spanish Fort.

Those aren’t the only local players on the USA roster, but they make up a huge part of the nucleus of this year’s team. Head coach Kane Wommack has been very vocal about making sure South Alabama maintains a major focus on recruiting players from the home region. He’s set a goal of signing at least five players from the region in every class. That’s smart.

Of course, local players starring on Saturdays has been a weekly occurrence for years. But it was awesome to see so many of them making game-changing plays in such a short period of time last Saturday.

• Where have all the college football dynasties gone?

Alabama is still one of the best teams in college football. Oddsmakers believe the Tide is headed for an 11-1 regular season. But opposing teams don’t seem to be intimidated by Alabama this season.

Look, it was never realistic to think losing DeVonta Smith, Jaylen Waddle, Mac Jones, Najee Harris, Landon Dickerson and Alex Leatherwood to the NFL wouldn’t be felt by the Alabama offense. That doesn’t even include first-round pick Patrick Surtain and second-rounder Christian Barmore from the defense.

But the domination is missing from Alabama games this season — even from the 52-24 win over Tennessee.

After an off week, we will see if some of that Alabama swagger can be found. If not, this will be a good but not great season. That standard isn’t fair, but that’s the monster Nick Saban has created in Tuscaloosa.

Things could be much worse. The two most recent national champions before Alabama — LSU in 2019 and Clemson in 2018 — are a combined 8-7 this season. 

Clemson’s largest win over a Division I team is 6 points. The Tigers’ other two Division I wins are by 3 and 6 points. It could be the Tigers were simply a dynasty because of the presence of superstar quarterbacks Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence.

At least Clemson is still trying. I’m not sure that’s true for all the players at LSU after they were blown out at Ole Miss. With road games still remaining against Alabama and Texas A&M, things could get really ugly for LSU in the farewell tour of Ed Orgeron. Even home games against Arkansas and Louisiana-Monroe could provide embarrassment.

Randy Kennedy, who has been a leading voice on the Gulf Coast sports scene for 19 years, writes a weekly column for Lagniappe. His sports talk show airs weekdays from 2-6 p.m. on Sports Talk 99.5 and the free iHeart radio app.