Jalen Hurts led the Philadelphia Eagles to a Super Bowl victory on Sunday, earning MVP honors. His journey to NFL stardom, however, may have taken a different path without a pivotal moment during his college career at Alabama in 2018.
Despite being the SEC Offensive Player of the Year and boasting a 26-2 record as a starter, Hurts was benched by coach Nick Saban in favor of freshman Tua Tagovailoa during the College Football Playoff national championship game.
“Well, we’ve always had a lot of faith in Jalen, and, you know, I told him when we put him in when Tua got hurt, ‘It’s your time,'” Saban said. “He certainly took advantage of it and did a fantastic job. I’m so proud of this guy for what he’s done this year, I can’t even tell you.
“Great comeback for our team. Showed a tremendous amount of resiliency, you know, in the game. We didn’t play great, but we won the SEC today and we’re so happy about that.”
Same vibes. Different setting. pic.twitter.com/ImS8YtD6yP
— Sidelines – Bama (@SSN_Alabama) February 10, 2025
The following season, although Hurts was second on the depth chart behind Tagovailoa, he seized an opportunity when Tagovailoa was injured in the fourth quarter of the SEC Championship. Hurts entered the game and led Alabama to a thrilling 35-28 comeback win over Georgia.
The next year, he transferred to Oklahoma, where his standout performances earned him a second-round selection in the 2020 NFL Draft.
“A lot of us, after the thrill of the win, as we started to come down, we started laughing to ourselves going, ‘Are we involved in some kind of Disney movie we’re unaware of?’ It was too weird,” Alex Mortensen, a former Alabama analyst, said to ESPN. “But, it was awesome. A lot of people were excited for him because of the way he conducted himself. You really wanted him to have personal success.”
Despite his success with the Sooners and in the NFL, that decisive day at Mercedes-Benz Stadium remains a defining moment in his career.
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