Well, it wasn't Alabama's best defense and Nick Saban had a lot of coaching turnover and Tua Taigavaloa couldn't tell where Jerry Jeudy was and Paul Finebum said that Clemson's offense benefitted from Alabama having to prep for a muuuuuuuch tougher prelim opponent than Clemson had .
Oh and Dexter Lawrence's suspension was a big distraction to Alabama ... causing them so many menal errs. Couple all of that with the stress of playing that SEC schedule and you can see why the Tigers were extremely lucky to squeak out a 4 touchdown nail-biter.