TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Alabama running back Damien Harris has heard more “rat-poison” speeches from his head coach than he can count. This week he’ll likely hear another.
Almost a year removed from coining the now-famous phrase, Nick Saban was asked Monday about any potential “rat poison” his team might encounter following its 62-7 victory over Ole Miss last week.
No. 1 Alabama hosts No. 22 Texas A&M this week in a rematch of last year’s sloppy 27-19 victory in College Station which prompted Saban to compare the media’s praise of his team to a deadly toxin.
"I'm trying to get our players to listen to me instead of listening to you guys,” Saban said following last year’s game. “All that stuff you write about how good we are, all that stuff they hear on ESPN, it's like poison. It's like taking poison. Like rat poison.”
Alabama enters this week’s matchup in an almost identical position as last year. Then the Crimson Tide was fresh off a 66-3 win over Ole Miss. This year, Alabama became the first SEC team to score 50 or more points in its first three games.
“The standard of excellence cannot be affected by outside voices in terms of your preparation, your intensity, the level of focus you need to have,” Saban said Monday. “Because what you did yesterday really doesn’t matter, it’s what you’re going to do today, what you’re going to do in the next game. It’s like climbing a mountain. The higher you go, the more challenging it gets and the greater the focus needs to be and the more treacherous it can be.”
Texas A&M will be the first ranked opponent Alabama faces this season. The Aggies rank No. 5 in the nation in total offense with 596.3 yards per game and took then No. 2-ranked Clemson down to the wire in a 28-26 loss in College Station two weeks ago. Still, Alabama enters Saturday’s game as 27-point favorites, according to VegasInsider.com.
“You’ve just got to set your face and stay focused,” linebacker Christian Miller said. “You can’t let external factors get to you. We try to just not pay attention to all of that. We try to just take it one game at a time.”
While players will do their best to ignore it, there’s plenty of “rat poison” to consume. Alabama is the No. 1 team in both major polls and has tallied three straight 500-yard games for the first time since 2015. Quarterback Tua Tagovailoa is amongst the earlier favorites to win the Heisman Award, while receiver Jerry Jeudy has also heard his name mentioned after recording his third straight two-touchdown game. Alabama’s defense has also garnered heavy praise, allowing just one more touchdown than it has scored this season.
Alabama is bound to hear about all of that and more leading up to its 2:30 p.m. CT kickoff against Texas A&M on Saturday. Only this time, that praise will be falling on deaf ears.
“It’s not going to do us any good believing how good everybody says we are or buying into the media because that’s the quickest way to get disappointed,” Harris said. “It’s not that hard because Coach Saban does a good job of emphasizing that what you guys say or the rest of the media says doesn’t really matter. We just need to focus on our team and how we can continue to improve.”