Alabama football’s offense struggled to gain any foothold against Michigan, costing the Crimson Tide in Tuesday’s ReliaQuest Bowl. The Crimson Tide fell 19-13, in a game it had every chance to win, even late.

UA quarterback Jalen Milroe completed 16 of his 32 passing attempts for 192 yards. Other than one 41-yard run, he had trouble finding room on the ground too, finishing with 94 yards, adjusted to remove sacks.

Still, Alabama’s running backs only got 12 total carries. After the game, Crimson Tide head coach Kalen DeBoer explained why Alabama didn’t try to get them more involved.

“I think that (Michigan is) one of the top five rushing defenses,” DeBoer said. “I know that there’s personnel on both teams that were different, maybe from what you’d see in the regular season, both us and them, but I think there was certainly part of our game plan to where we felt we needed to spit the ball out and get the ball in the right guys’ hands.”

DeBoer went on to say that the Crimson Tide didn’t execute during the game like it had during the practices leading up to the bowl. The loss snapped a streak of 10-win seasons for Alabama, which dated back to 2008, ending the year 9-4.

Among the running backs, Jam Miller led the way, with 10 carries for 27 yards. Richard Young also ran the ball for six yards on two attempts.

“There were some runs that I think Jam at the end of the game poured up in there, at the end of the first half,” DeBoer said. “I really thought he did a nice job getting us out from behind our own end zone there, so he ran hard. I think just having a little bit of a balance was important for us in this game, just because of, kind of, who they were and a little bit of what we felt we could do to attack them.”