How Alabama Baited John Mateer Into First Half Pick Six

NORMAN, Okla. -- Many men, wish death upon me. That's the primary lyrics from 50 Cent's song "Many Men", a song from his 2003 album "Get Rich or Die Trying". Many men did wish death upon Alabama's 2025 season as the No. 9 Crimson Tide fell down 17-0 to No. 8 Oklahoma inside Gaylord Family Memorial Stadium. But the Crimson Tide had other plans.

Alabama stacked play after play towards the end of the first quarter and ended up overcoming its 17-point deficit to head into the halftime locker room of their first round College Football Playoff Game tied on the scoreboard.

The Crimson Tide mounted an offensive drive to cut into the lead, converting a fourth-and-2 from the doorstep of the goal line to get on the board. The defense responded by sending Oklahoma's offense to the sidelines three plays later, but made an even bigger play as Tim Keenan blocked Grayson Miller's punt to set the Alabama offense up with great field position. Five plays later Conor Talty made his first field goal of the night to bring the visitors to within one score with two minutes remaining in the half.

Alabama's goal then was simple, prevent Oklahoma from scoring again in the half to head into the locker room and regroup in a one-score game. But sophomore cornerback Zabien Brown had other plans.

Brown benefitted from a bait-and-switch called by defensive coordinator Kane Wommack and took a second-down interception 50-yards to the endzone to tie the game before juiceboxes and orange slices.

"You can't go score a 17-point touchdown," Kalen DeBoer said. "You've got to score one score, even if it's three points. That's what our guys did. I know ZB got the interception right before half, that was big, but I was actually feeling really good about the spot we were in before that."

DeBoer and the coaching staff benefited from their typical aggression, calling a timeout before the second down play as they looked to preserve time and give its offense another shot at points, but Brown handled that as they tricked Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer into a mistake.

"Just really, if they want to be aggressive and you can get an incomplete pass we can get one more shot," DeBoer said. "You've seen us go down the field at the end of a half and try to get three or seven points. Make them have to punt it, especially with what had happened earlier. You can go after them, just keep applying pressure. Make them snap it again. Just felt like we were at on the field, I know they've got a really good field goal kicker. But they weren't far from being in his range either. That's just how we've kind of played. We're not reckless, but you also want to be aggressive."

So what kind of momentum did Brown provide the team? The Crimson Tide came out of the locker room and scored the next 10 points to take control of the round one College Football Playoff game. Oklahoma's offense opened the second half with two straight straight three-and-outs and gained just four yards on six plays.

"About like all momentum shifts from a pick-six comes. When you can not only flip the field but then score, really awesome,"Wommack said.

How did Wommack and Brown trick Mateer? The defensive coordinator showed the Sooners' quarterback a blitz look but had his team drop into a coverage look upon the snap. The pre-snap disguise caused Mateer to audible into a dangerous route and the rest was history.

"Our players did a really good job of adjusting." Wommack said. "We saw something we thought we could get them and bait them into it. We had showed a little bit of zero pressure and then all of a sudden we baited into a drop-eight cover-two and Zabien made a hell of a play."

It's Brown's second pick-six on the season and each of them both came in critical moments to close a first half. The sophomore took a 99-yard interception for a score against Tennessee that virtually knocked the Volunteers out before the break, and his 50-yard return in Norman signaled the Crimson Tide were the ones that were hard to kill.

"We run a lot of cover-zero. We just ran a simulated cover-two, so I'm dropping into the flat on the zero look. I saw him kind of audibling over there, reading his eyes it kind of looked like he wanted to go over there presnap." Zabien Brown said. "I just fell into the flat, the ball fell right in my hand. My mindset, I've just got to get to that zone. Can't get tackled."

Alabama Crimson Tide.

"It's just a clutch gene, I don't know what it is. It's just clutch," Brown said.