Penn State football & Alabama share an odd connection this week

The Penn State football team finds themselves tied to the Alabama Crimson Tide this week. Two teams that are optimistic about making the college football playoff in 2023. While they don’t face each other during week 3 of the college football season, they are connected in other ways. As Alabama hits the road to play a non-conference opponent this Saturday. Something the team has only done three times in the 17 years that Nick Saban has been the head coach at Alabama.

Penn State football & Alabama share an odd connection this week

While the Penn State football team will be on the road this weekend at Illinois, the Alabama football team will hit the road as well. Expect they will be playing a non-conference opponent. Alabama travels to South Flordia in a game where the Crimson Tide will be heavy favorites.

But how does this relate to Penn State? Well, Nick Saban has only coached in 3 non-conference road games in his 17 years at Alabama. One of those games was in 2011 when the Crimson Tide traveled to Penn State and beat the Nittany Lions 27-11. The other games were against Duke in 2010, and Texas in 2022. Alabama is undefeated in each of these matchups.

Saturday's game at USF will be only Alabama’s 4th non-conference true road game in 17 seasons under Nick Saban. The list:

Sept 16, 2023: at USF
Sept 10, 2022: at Texas 20-19
Sept 10, 2011: at Penn State 27-11
Sept 18, 2010: at Duke 62-13

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) September 11, 2023

Remembering the 2011 Penn State vs. Alabama Game

A game that many Penn State fans would rather forget, is when the Nittany Lions hosted Alabama. The Nittany Lions lost 27-11 in a game that allowed A.J. McCarron to win the starting QB job at Alabama. Trent Richardson ran for 111 yards and 2 touchdowns. The Crimson Tide defense only allowed one touchdown to Penn State RB Silas Redd late in the fourth quarter.

This game was also Joe Paterno’s final loss of his career as he was later fired during the 2011 season.

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