The Alabama Crimson Tide is set to face its third potential revenge game of the season after rectifying two of last season’s losses this year in Tennessee and Vanderbilt.

Now, Alabama gets the chance to host Oklahoma at home after a loss in Norman last year effectively ended their chances at the College Football Playoff.

The stakes this time around are not quite as high, but the Tide can also come within a hair of locking down their spot in the SEC title game should they win.

This Sooners team is much better than last year’s team though, as they are extremely stingy on defense with one of the better quarterbacks in the nation in John Mateer. Despite it being a different team, the Tide has last year’s game on its mind, and Kalen DeBoer made sure his team knows that.

“We have a lot of new players on the team so there’s a lot of guys that didn’t experience that. The ones that did certainly better remember,” DeBoer said when asked about last year’s Oklahoma game.

“More importantly, you’re facing a really good program that obviously we went to their place and got beat up pretty good last year and that’s who’s coming to town this week. You can’t help but remember the past…our guys should remember that because our experience helps us to be better the next time around.”

DeBoer’s teams have not yet lost a game at Bryant-Denny Stadium — and they surely don’t intend to start this week.

In order to ensure that this is the case though, it’s absolutely essential they are at their best and ready to take on what is one of the tougher tests of their season in Oklahoma.

Clearly, DeBoer is encouraging his players to draw on the disappointment of last year for motivation.

Thus far, it’s worked — but they will need it to again on Saturday at 2:30 p.m. CST.

Michael Brauner is a Senior Sports Analyst and Contributing Writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @MBraunerWNSP and hear him every weekday morning from 6 to 9 a.m. on “The Opening Kickoff” on WNSP-FM 105.5, available free online.