Alabama faces Cincinnati in 2021 Cotton Bowl

The Alabama Crimson Tide and Cincinnati Bearcats will face off in the Cotton Bowl as two of the final four teams to make the 2021 College Football Playoff. The game will take place at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Kickoff is currently set to take place at 7:30 p.m. ET on New Year’s Eve, following the Orange Bowl.

The game will air on ESPN and will be available via live stream at WatchESPN. The winner of the Cotton Bowl will advance to the 2022 College Football Playoff National Championship game on Monday, January 10th.

Alabama (12-1, 7-1 SEC)

Alabama showed how dangerous they can be as they took down the Georgia Bulldogs in the SEC Championship game with ease. Even with an early 10-0 deficit, the Tide rolled back to a 41-24 win. Quarterback Bryce Young is favored to be the Heisman winner as he threw for 4,322 yards and 43 touchdowns with only four interceptions this year. While the offense is what Bama is known for, their defense ranks third in the country for the most sacks. A victory over the Bulldogs to win the SEC Championship earned them the No. 1 seed in the CFP.

Cincinnati (13-0, 8-0 American)

Well, they did it. The Bearcats finished the season undefeated as they took down Houston in the American conference championship game, 35-20. In the win, quarterback Desmond Ridder threw for three touchdowns, but it was running back Jerome Ford that was the belle of the ball with 187 rushing yards with two touchdowns. All eyes usually fall on Ridder and the offense when the Bearcats play, but their defense only gave up 16.1 points per game which led the conference and 305.8 yards per game and 37 total sacks which ranked second in the conference. Cincinnati wanted to prove that they belonged, and now they’ll get that opportunity as the No. 4 seed in the CFP.