quote:
“We ran out of gas a little bit on defense,” Saban said after the 47-23 win over the Gamecocks. “But we played 86 plays on defense, which is a lot, especially in conditions like this.”

quote:
“We don’t have enough players to get through the season if we play 86 plays of defense every week,” Saban said. “But the defense has to get off the field. We had opportunities to get off the field on third down. There were way too many penalties in the game. We stopped ourselves with penalties, and we helped them with penalties on defense by jumping offsides on 3rd and 10, and then on 3rd and 5, they scored a touchdown. Third and 10 is a lot different to play defense than 3rd and 5."

quote:
“So, there’s a lot of fixing to do, there’s a lot of things that we can improve. I like the chemistry of our team, I like the character of our guys. I just hope we can stay healthy enough to persevere.”

quote:
“They did a great job of stopping them in the red zone when they needed to,” Saban said. “But it was a little disappointing that we didn’t execute better between what after they got there to get them there.
“There was a lot of adjusting to do. The young players had a lot of problems adjusting to the quads and to the empty formation in the boundary, which we had worked on, but it was a lot for the linebackers. So, we had to stay pretty simple in terms of what we were doing, afraid that we would not do things correctly. So, when the field shrunk, we were able to get them stopped, and I think the players showed a lot of resiliency in doing that.”

quote:
“There was a lot of confusion with the young guys, with the formations and the motions and some of the things that they were doing,” Saban said. “We tried to get (Harris) settled down by taking him out of the game and put Kaho in for a series. And then we put him back in the game, and then we decided to play Kaho a little bit because he’s a good football player and he needs to get some experience, himself.”

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Posted by UltimaParadox

Huntsville

Member since Nov 2008

40909 posts

Posted on 9/14/19 at 10:40 pm to SummerOfGeorge

Saban being honest here, and it makes sense.

As I said in another thread, hopefully there is a lot of things to learn from this game. Some players are already taking this as a bad game even though we won by 24. Really muschamp had something to prove, he honestly tried everything today

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Posted by Bham4Tide

In a Van down by the River

Member since Feb 2011

22114 posts

Posted on 9/14/19 at 10:46 pm to SummerOfGeorge

The good news is that we have nearly a month before we play another decent team - A&M. That is 4 weeks (including an off week) to work with the defense and the younger guys - who looked like freshman today.

In Saban I trust . . . until the wheels fall off.

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Posted by Cobrasize

Birmingham

Member since Jun 2013

49682 posts

Posted on 9/14/19 at 11:11 pm to SummerOfGeorge

Kaho will end up taking the spot.

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Posted by 3down10

Member since Sep 2014

23042 posts

Posted on 9/15/19 at 1:40 am to SummerOfGeorge

I was traveling all day and haven't got to watch the game yet, other than Tua's highlights on ESPN.

How was the pressure and blitzes being called? I know with the middle being so young that is no doubt where many problems occur, but I figure the talent is there and will improve over the year. Trial by fire, lots of growth.

But I've been worried about the play calling on that side of the ball since after the Clemson game when it was said Golding basically called that game, not Tosh.

Is that side of things looking improved over last year? I know it's probably unreasonable to expect Pruitt type levels, but I really hope it's not terrible like the Clemson game.

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Posted by Roll Tide Ravens