Football 🏈 Tony's takes: Breaking down Nick Saban's final press conference before Ole Miss

[Tony_Tsoukalas]

Alabama will open up SEC play on Saturday when it hosts Ole Miss at 2:30 p.m. CT inside Bryant-Denny Stadium. Wednesday, Nick Saban spoke to reporters in his final press conference before the matchup.

Here’s a transcript of what he said as well as my takes on his comments.

Opening statement

“I think this is one of those games that you really look forward to as a competitor. It’s an opportunity to play in our stadium against a really good team. The players look forward to that. It’s great for our fans, it’s great for our players, the environment they get the opportunity to play in.

“But I think, internally, we want players to be working to get the kind of mental intensity that you need to practice with a sense of urgency, so that you’re developing the right habits so you can do your job on a consistent basis. If you evaluate our team, to this point in the games, when we do things correctly, we’re pretty good. But when we don’t do things correctly — and it only takes on person, on offense, defense, special teams to not do their job correctly — without the focus or intensity that you need to execute, then we’re not so good. That’s the key to the drill to me.

“Can we, on a consistent basis, have the kind of focus and mental intensity — can we develop the habits that will carry over in the game to help us play with more consistency? That’s what we’re really focusing on this week and hopefully we’re making some progress.”

Tony’s take: Saban made a good point in his final statement. Alabama has shown flashes of being a really good team at times this season. Before falling apart late against Texas, the Tide’s defense held a high-powered Longhorns offense at bay for most of the game. Jalen Milroe has also hit on some big throws and shown he can be explosive with his legs.

The problem has been Alabama’s inability to sustain that success without breakdowns or penalties. Doing so this week will likely revolve around improvements in the intermediate passing game as well as a more disciplined approach on both sides of the ball.

Injury update on Tyler Booker and Jaheim Oatis

“Tyler Booker is practicing. So is Jaheim Oatis. They haven’t had issues. That doesn’t mean they still aren’t day-to-day, in terms of coming back and getting over injuries. But they are practicing.”

Tony’s take: Back injuries are tricky, but it seems like both Booker and Oatis will be available for this weekend’s game. Saban didn’t provide an update on Kendrick Law, who missed the USF game due to illness. However, the sophomore receiver was pictured in Alabama’s practice photos earlier this week.

On how Milroe has been practicing

“It’s going good. His energy has been good. His attitude has been great. I think the execution on the field has been good. So it’s been good.”

Tony’s take: Being named the starting quarterback has to take some of the weight off of Milroe’s shoulders heading into this weekend’s game. Now it's time to see if he can back his head coach up with a solid performance.

On Wes Neighbors

"He was on staff here and I always knew that he’d be a really good coach. He’s developed into a nice coach. Those guys play really well. His guys play really well. They play hard. You know, Pete does a good job with the defense. They’ve got a good scheme. I think they’re playing a lot better on defense because of it. They play with a lot of inspiration and they do a good job of executing the scheme and I’m sure Wes has a lot to do with that."

Tony’s take: Ole Miss safeties coach Wes Neighbors III, played safety under Saban at Alabama from 2008-11. He then coached under him, serving as a student assistant (2011-12), defensive intern (2013), graduate assistant (2014) and analyst (2015-17). Neighbors comes from a long Alabama lineage as his father and grandfather both played for the Crimson Tide.

On fewer freshmen appearances

“Yeah well, I think last year we had two out of three games where we had an opportunity to play a lot of players. This year we’ve only had one opportunity to do that. I do think that we have two freshmen starting. I don’t know how that compares to how many guys we had in the past. I don’t know what the significance of that is. If we don’t have to play freshman before they’re ready to play I think that’s probably a good thing for our team. But I also like to see the growth of the young players as freshmen so that when they do get an opportunity to play they’ll be able to take advantage of it.”

Tony’s take: I asked this question for something I’m working on. Alabama has had just 20 combined freshmen appearances through three weeks as compared to 35 at this point last year. Saban makes a good point when bringing up close games. However, there have also been fewer freshmen on special teams so far this year. I’ll delve into this a bit more later this week.

On playing more running backs

“Well I hope so, I think Jase and Roydell have played very, very well, both guys. We also have confidence in Jam and Justice and I think both of those guys will contribute at some point in time in the season pretty significantly because they’re both really good players and I think they’re both ready to play.”

Tony’s take: It’s been a bit surprising that we haven’t seen more from Justice Haynes or Jam Miller, considering their strong offseason performances. As Saban pointed out earlier, it’s been tougher to get younger players more action in close games. Still, Haynes and Miller appear to be too talented to keep on the bench.

On the backup QB

“Right now Ty Simpson has been getting most of the work with the twos and I thought he did a good job when he went in the game. He’s kind of earned the right to be in that position. I’m sure that he’ll continue to compete and try to get better and that’ll be good for us in the long term and we want to develop every player that we have in that position and continue to work with all those guys so they all get reps and have a chance to improve.”

Tony’s take: This isn’t a surprise to me. Simpson did a decent job of managing the offense after coming in for Tyler Buchner over the weekend. After starting the game with four incompletions, the redshirt freshman completed his final five passes for 73 yards while also running in the game-clinching touchdown from a yard out with 33 seconds remaining.

Earlier Wednesday, Saban said he has not considered using a two-quarterback system this weekend. However, if Milroe doesn’t show improvement, we might not have seen the last of Simpson this season.

 

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