Tua Tagovailoa is a hero at Alabama after taking over in the second half of last season’s national championship game and engineering a comeback that gave the Crimson Tide a 26-23 overtime win over Georgia.

But as the quarterback revealed Thursday, if he had not gotten into that game, it’s likely he would have never taken another snap for ’Bama — because, frustrated over his role as a backup, he was all set to transfer.

“Even throughout my football season, I wasn’t the starter. I wanted to leave the school,’’ Tagovailoa told a group of seventh- and eighth-graders at his former intermediate school in Ewa Beach, Hawaii, as reported by Hawaii News Now.

“So I told myself if I didn’t play in the last game, which was the national championship game, I would transfer out. If I gave in, I don’t think I would have seen the end blessing of where I am now.”

Tagovailoa also said, “I called my dad and asked him if my offer to the University of Southern California was still available.”

As a freshman, Tagovailoa, now 20, backed up sophomore starter Jalen Hurts, getting into seven regular-season games and completing 35 of 53 passes for 470 yards and eight touchdowns.

But when Hurts faltered in the first half of the championship game, coach Nick Saban turned to Tagovailoa, who rallied the Tide from a 13-point hole. The Alabama win was capped by Tagovailoa’s 41-yard touchdown pass to DeVonta Smith on the Tide’s second possession in overtime.

There had been rumors even before Tagovailoa’s heroics that he was fed up with his small role — and his talk to students Thursday confirmed them.

Former Alabama offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin had fanned the rumors when, the day after the championship game, he said on The Dan Patrick Show that people “that really know what’s going on would tell you that Tua was leaving” if he didn’t play, ESPN reported.

“Tua thought that he should be the starting quarterback and had outperformed (Hurts) in practice and coach (Nick Saban) never gave him an opportunity,” Kiffin, now the Florida Atlantic head coach, said at the time.