It was like watching a replay of Alabama’s football loss to Vanderbilt at times on Saturday. The Crimson Tide defeated South Carolina 27-25 in Tuscaloosa, but the defense still struggled to get off the field.

In total, the Gamecocks converted seven of their 15 third downs. The second half numbers looked worse, however, with USC making first downs on seven of 10 attempts, most of which went on a long drive to start the third quarter.

‘We can’t have five on one trip, can we? And I think there’s just a desire to find a way to make the piece,” DeBoer said. “I’ll watch the film, and we’ll all understand what happened to a lot of that. Some of them put them in some good situations.

“I remember the ball they caught over the middle was advantageous for us in terms of distance and distance. And that’s the one we really need to get off the football field. And they are difficult to convert, just from an attacking side, and we succeeded.”

The drive, which ended in a touchdown that put the Gamecocks ahead, asked a lot of Alabama’s defense, running 16 plays and 85 yards, taking 8:35 off the game clock. However, the group recovered, at least enough to come out of Bryant-Denny Stadium with a win.

As DeBoer noted, things went better the rest of the game.

“For a lot of the game I felt like we did a good job,” DeBoer said. “I can’t say we did great, but that drive that came out in the second half definitely set the tone and made things difficult for us for the rest of the game. So you gotta start a little quicker when we come out.

Alabama moved to 5-1 with Saturday’s win to reach the halfway mark of the 2024 season. It is currently 2-1 in SEC play.

The Crimson Tide is back in action next week, facing Tennessee in Knoxville.