Nelson Chenault-US PRESSWIRE
Alabama head coach Nick Saban is forcing his team to move forward after its eye-popping 52-0 win on the road against Arkansas last weekend, as preparations for Florida Atlantic begin today.
“We always see things we can improve on,” Saban said. “We had too many penalties in all areas. We still need to work on developing consistency in some areas of our game.”
Safety HaHa Clinton-Dix added, “As soon as you mess up, no matter what the score is, if you make a mental error he’s going to be all over you. He doesn’t want us to get too overconfident and lose focus on what our goals are for this year.”
Prized pigskin
Alabama has dominated its opponents in numerous facets of the game so far, but especially in turnovers. After forcing five Razorback turnovers and not committing one, Alabama enters its second home game of the season with a 12-1 turnover margin.
“We do turnover drills everyday,” Saban said. “We try to get the ball out in the drills we have and when the ball’s on the ground, we try to scoop it.”
The success with turnovers is more physical than mental for the Tide this season.
“I think we have a better buy-in than we’ve ever had before and I think that’s starting to show,” Saban said. “It gets contagious at times. When you start getting a lot of turnovers, everybody is sort of focused on that and you can continue to create plays and get them. When you’re not getting them, everybody is focused on how you can get them and that becomes a roadblock in your mind.”
The Tide’s turnover practice can get intense, with the defense doing everything they can to pry the ball free.
“The defense is gong to try to take the ball any way they can, even if it’s after the play and you’re going back to the huddle,” running back Eddie Lacy said. “Robert Lester, he’s a sneaky one. He’ll wait for you to turn around and jog back to the huddle and he’ll knock it out from behind you everytime.”
When ball security is in question, all concern for fairness is eradicated.
“It’s not fair, but coaches don’t care about fair, they care about the ball,” Lacy said.
Running backs have more than a defense to deal with, as strength and conditioning coach Scott Cochran likes to get in on the fun.
“He gets you right when you least expect it,” Lacy said. “We’ll watch out for him the whole time, but then we’ll kind of forget about him, then he’ll pop up and knock the ball out. It’s fun for him.”
To backpedal, or not to backpedal
As he continues his recovery from an injury, former Alabama and current Cincinnati Bengal defensive back Dre Kirkpatrick made headlines for telling the official Bengals website that he never backpedaled while with the Tide. The comments even prompted an in-depth article on smartfootball.com, which explained how the strategy was an intelligent one.
Wrong.
“They’re taught to backpedal,” Saban said. “You come to practice everyday, they backpedal in individual (drills). They backpedal sometimes when they’re playing.”
The comment was puzzling to his former teammates.
“We do backpedal in practice, so I don’t really know where that came from,” Clinton-Dix said.
Saban went on to discuss the matter in more detail.
“We play our corners up on people a lot,” he said. “Sometimes they bump-and-run, sometimes they get off and backpedal.
“We teach them to backpedal, we teach them to plant-and-drive out of the backpedal.”
Saban continued on to show his personal dedication to the maneuver.
“I can backpedal,” Saban said. “I could backpedal when I played and I still can. I can still cover a guy, too.”
Spreading the wealth
Throughout the years in the Southeastern Conference, elite quarterbacks have been able to depend on a singular elite wide receiver when they need it most. Georgia’s Matthew Stafford had A.J. Green, Alabama’s Greg McElroy had Julio Jones and South Carolina’s Alshon Jeffery was the No. 1 target for the Gamecocks.
AJ McCarron, however, has a different approach. McCarron is the most efficient passer in the SEC, statistically speaking, with a conference-leading pass efficiency rating of 196.6 and being one of four quarterbacks in the conference to average over 200 yards per game and have zero interceptions this season.
McCarron does not lean on one wide receiver for his numbers. McCarron has found 13 different receivers for his 36 completions this season, including four running backs and two tight ends. McCarron has spread his seven passing touchdowns to five different receivers.
“It’s not just one person, we’re going to do everything collectively,” wide receiver Christion Jones said. “Our receiving corps has gotten stronger every week. We’re focusing on our technique in our routes and our timing with AJ.”
Alabama does not see itself as an outlier in the conference for this tendency, but as carrying out its methodology.
“Anyone’s number can get called,” Jones said. “It’s all about everybody doing their job and everybody being in the right position at the right time.”
Personnel check
Saban said that there are no injuries to report from the Arkansas game outside of what he labeled as the usual Monday aches and pains.
Saban also released that Jalston Fowler was released from the hospital after his knee surgery. He stayed in the hospital for a few days while the team was in Fayetteville, but is now out and working on rehabilitation.