TAMPA, Fla. — When he saw Nick Saban last March, Dabo Swinney told the Alabama head coach at the time, “We’d see each other in Tampa, again.”
The meeting between the two head coaches was just two months removed from Alabama’s 45-40 victory over Clemson in last year’s national championship game, one of the greatest title games in the history of college football. Now, in what is dubbed “Alabama vs. Clemson: The Sequel” the two, just like Swinney said, are in Tampa, playing for the national championship, again.
“I thought that we were a young team,” Swinney said on Sunday from Tampa Convention Center during the College Football Playoff Championship Game coaches’ press conference.