Everything Nick Saban said following Alabama’s emotional win over Arkansas
In one of the strangest, most momentum-swinging games you have ever seen, No. 2 Alabama went on the road and defeated the Arkansas Razorbacks 49-26.
The Crimson Tide would come out of the gates on fire and quickly jumped on the Hogs 14-0. Then, one of the scariest moments of the college football season happened when star quarterback Bryce Young exited the contest with a shoulder injury.
Following the contest, Crimson Tide head coach Nick Saban would meet with members of the media and would update the status of Young as well as give his thoughts on how the Tide performed in the adversity-filled game.
Our friend at Razorbacks Wire Eric Bolin was able to sit in on the press conference and was generous enough to share coach Saban’s post-game quotes with us.
Opening statement
Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
Obviously, this is a really good win for our team. I thought one of the messages that we tried to give the team was you have to maintain your intensity in the game for 60 minutes in the game, regardless of what the score is and regardless… I don’t think we did that. We didn’t maintain our intensity. We let them get back in the game at one point. … It’s hard to win on the road. There are a lot of things we can learn from this game. … A lot to learn, but it’s also an SEC road game against a good team and I was proud of the way our guys competed. … The kicking game errors, the onside kick, the bad snap on the punt. Those were really our errors. Our errors. They’re all fixable and things we’re looking forward to getting better at.
Bryce Young injury update
Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
Bryce has a little AC sprain in his shoulder. We’ll have to take it day-to-day. I think he’s OK. He doesn’t have a serious injury. We didn’t think it was, he could go back in the game today because I didn’t think he had much steam throwing the ball. He’s had these before and in a few days, he’s responded really well. We’ll just have to see how it goes.
On the run blocking in the fourth quarter
Photo by Wesley Hitt/Getty Images
Really good blocking. One of them, Jalen scrambled on a critical third down on a big play. The long runs Jahmyr made were really well-blocked. … He’s really really good at pressing the hole.
On if the game plan changed once Jalen Milroe entered the game
Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
There are things that Jalen does well. We practice some of those things and if he has to play, we’ll practice them more. But I thought he did a good job of managing the game today. Gave our team a chance to win. We scored how many points with him playing quarterback. It wasn’t all bad.
On the defenses effort
Photo by Wesley Hitt/Getty Images
Can’t play defense if you don’t have great intensity. Can’t tackle well if you don’t have great intensity. You lose that, you get soft. Three-yard runs become eight-yard runs. It’s 2nd-and-2 instead of 2nd-and-8. We lost contain a couple of times. Just maintain your intensity. Stay focused on what you have to do to do your job. And you have to do it with physical toughness, being aggressive. … Everybody has the opportunity to make good choices and decisions and to play smart. We need to do a better job of that.
On Jalen Milore's long run in the fourth quarter
Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
It stopped the bleeding for sure because that was 3rd-and-long in bad field position. If we don’t make a first down there, they’re going… That was a huge momentum swing in the game in my opinion. After that, we played better. After that, I think they didn’t play as well.
On the offense without Bryce Young
Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
Bryce is a great player. There’s only one Bryce Young in this country and he’s a great player. Jalen can do what Jalen does well and we have confidence in him. We have confidence in the development of Ty Simpson as his backup, but hopefully, Bryce will be OK. I thought the offense did a really good job of continuing to score points in a different way than when Bryce plays. You’ve got to have that kind of diversity on your team. You’ve got to be able to win more than one way.
On Bryce Young's ability to make plays on third down
Photo by Wesley Hitt/Getty Images
Bryce does a good job of reading the coverage. We didn’t know how they would play us going into this game. They’ve been playing four down quite a bit, seven guys in coverage. They started out the game playing three down, six DBs right off the bat. It was a little tougher for him because of a lot of eight drops and they have a really good blitz package. He did a really good job of handling the protection. … He should have thrown the ball away. We were in field-goal range and not taking a chance of getting hit but he really kind of fell on his shoulder so that was the issue. But he does a really good job of reading coverage.
On the center position
Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
WE think Darien is a really good player, but we have a lot of confidence in Seth. Had to play down the stretch in some big games. We have a lot of confidence in him. But look, we want to get all of our players healthy. Depth on your team is important. … Kool-Aid had to go play Star and he ain’t practiced one play at Star. He’s a smart guy so he knows the coverages but he’s never played that position, but he did a good job on the series he was in there, then we got the other guy back in there. Depth on your team is really important.
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