Don’t tell Nick Saban that his Alabama football team can afford to lose its SEC Championship Game with Florida. And don’t tell Florida coach Jim McElwain that his Gators have no chance against the No. 1 Crimson Tide.

Freshman quarterback Jalen Hurts has led the Tide offense to an undefeated regular season. (Kent Gidley/UA Athletics)

Both points were made as the coaches met the press before facing one another for their league title.

The consensus of many is that a close loss to Florida would not derail the Tide train to the College Football Playoffs. Alabama is the only undefeated Power 5 team in the top 20 teams in the CFP rankings and, as the prohibitive top team, a loss is not expected to keep it out of the top four.

But Saban dismissed such talk, saying that winning the championship of his league is something he holds in the highest esteem. He blasted media members for being singularly focused on the playoff picture.

“You don’t care about any teams in the country that aren’t in the playoffs,” he said. “If we don’t win this game, maybe we throw a stink bomb out there, maybe we don’t make the playoffs.

“Alls I know is if we play and we play well, we control our own destiny in terms of what we do,” the Tide coach continued. “Is it OK to lose this game? It’s never OK to lose a game.”

McElwain was nearly as committed to his stance that his team isn’t simply showing up to lose. Teamspeedkills.com reported that Per OddsShark had the Crimson Tide opening anywhere from a 21.5-point to a 22-point favorite.  In a short amount of time, that line increased to between 24 points and 24.5 points, a staggering three-plus touchdown point spread.

The Crimson Tide defense has kept opponents out of the end zone for more than a month. (Kent Gidley/UA Athletics)

“I don’t consider it a mismatch at all,” the Gators coach said. “I look at it as a great opportunity. That’s part of the chess match. I know this: We’re playing in this game and we’re going to give ourselves every opportunity to go be successful.”

CBSsports.com said Florida and Alabama are walking wounded going into the 2:30 p.m. Saturday contest on CBS. Florida, down to many of its second-stringers already, thanks to injuries to nine starters, has seen its injury report grow in length each week since taking control of the SEC East.

McElwain confirmed Monday that Luke Del Rio (shoulder), Alex Anzalone (arm), Jarrad Davis (ankle), Bryan Cox Jr. (ankle), Jordan Sherit (leg), Cam Dillard (knee), Marcus Maye (arm) and Jaewon Taylor (arm) will be scratched from the active roster against the Tide. Those updates were known or assumed, with Davis’ continued absence serving as the worst setback. Davis is a senior leader and arguably the best player (offense or defense) on the Gators roster.

On the Alabama sideline, the concern would be in the secondary where it had already lost Eddie Jackson after a season-ending leg injury in October. Last Saturday, the Tide had to turn to former walk-on Levi Wallace after defensive back Marlon Humphrey left the Iron Bowl with a leg injury.

Saban said they’ll take it easy on Humphrey and hope to get him into practice later this week.

Other state schools

Youngstown State at Jacksonville State: The Gamecocks, the No. 3 seed nationally in the Football Championship Subdivision, sat out the first round of the playoffs while Youngstown State was outlasting Samford 38-24. The Penguins and JSU square off at 1 p.m. on ESPN3.

The JSU Gamecocks, led by quarterback Eli Jenkins, will face the team that knocked Samford out of the playoffs. (JSU Athletics)

“We have a great opponent coming in this weekend with Youngstown State, and Coach (Bo) Pelini has done a great job up there,” said Jacksonville State coach John Grass. “I think they have been on an 11-year drought from the playoffs, so to get it turned around in his second year is huge.”

Grass said the Gamecocks will have to stop the Penguins’ rushing attack, try to create turnovers and be great on third down as they have been all year long.

North Greenville at North Alabama: The No. 7 Lions are playing in the NCAA Quarterfinal Playoff round for the 15th time in school history and facing a North Greenville team that they downed 52-21 in Florence on Oct. 22. This is the 21st time that UNA has played a team twice in a season and the 20th time the Lions have faced a team in the regular-season and then again in the playoffs.

North Alabama is 12-8 in rematch games and 11-8 in playoff rematches. Kickoff at Braly Stadium in Florence is at noon.

High schools

The Alabama High School Athletic Association‘s 21st Super 7 State Championships began Wednesday at Auburn University’s Jordan-Hare Stadium.

Hoover captured the state Class 7A championship by handing McGill-Toolen its only loss with a 17-7 victory last night. Hoover has won 10 state titles in the last 16 seasons.

The remaining championships are today and Friday. Here is the lineup.

Today

Class 3A Finals: Piedmont (14-0) vs. Mobile Christian (13-1), 11 a.m.
Class 1A Finals: Pickens County (11-3) vs. Maplesville (13-0), 3 p.m.
Class 5A Finals: Wenonah (11-2) vs. Beauregard (12-1), 7 p.m.

Friday

Class 4A Finals: Madison Academy (11-3) vs. Handley (12-2), 11 a.m.
Class 2A Finals: Fyffe (14-0) vs. Aliceville (13-1), 3 p.m.
Class 6A Finals: Ramsay (12-2) vs. Opelika (13-1), 7 p.m.