Alabama wide receiver Ryan Williams was selected as a semifinalist for the Shaun Alexander Award on Wednesday, the Maxwell Football Club announced Wednesday.
Williams is one of 14 semifinalists for the Alexander, which is presented annually to the most outstanding freshman player in college football. Finalists will be named on Dec. 4 with the 2024 winner of the Shaun Alexander Award being announced on Dec. 26.
The College Football Playoff selection committee released their first batch of rankings on Tuesday night, ranking Alabama No. 11.
That ranking would make Kalen DeBoer‘s first Alabama team as the final at-large team in the newly-expanded 12-team playoff, giving them the 11-seed if the playoff were to start today. As of the current bracket, Alabama would travel to 6-seed Texas for a first round playoff game.
The Crimson Tide has two wins over teams currently ranked by the committee, being No. 3 Georgia and No. 24 Missouri. Of Alabama’s two losses, one is to No. 7 Tennessee, and one is to unranked Vanderbilt.
As a refresher, the College Football Playoff expanded from four teams to 12 teams this season, but it’s not as simple as taking the top 12 teams in the rankings. There are automatic bids reserved for the five highest-ranked conference champions, likely being the SEC, Big Ten, ACC, Big 12 and one Group of Five conference. The top four conference champions will be given the top four seeds in the playoff and first-round bye, with the remaining conference champion and the seven at-large bids being seeding accordingly thereafter.
This is the first of six batches of rankings the selection committee will release between now and the end of the season. The committee will release new rankings every Tuesday night until conference championship week, with the final rankings being released on Sunday, Dec. 8 at 11 a.m. CT.
This week, Alabama has a huge matchup with No. 15 LSU in Baton Rouge. The winner of the game will put themselves squarely in position to make the playoff, while the loser will all but be eliminated with three weeks of the season to go.
