The Three Questions Facing Alabama Football Moving Forward
Because it had been more than a year since Alabama lost a football game, there were many players on this year's team that had never lost a game in a Crimson Tide uniform.
But after last Saturday's 41-38 loss to Texas A&M, every player has experienced one. This leads to three key questions for response and reflection according to coach Nick Saban.
"The question is, how did it make you feel?," Saban said during his weekly radio show Thursday night. "That's the first question. And the second question is, how did you contribute to it? And the third question is, is how will you respond to it? And all those things to me are going to be very telling about what kind of character we have on the team.”
Those three questions will define Alabama's season moving forward. How did the loss make you feel? How did you contribute to it? And how will you respond?
The real response will be seen on the field against Mississippi State on Saturday, but Saban said the players have been trying harder and paying attention throughout preparation this week.
The term "Alabama Standard" has been thrown around by coaches and players a lot this season, and on Thursday, Saban shared an interesting story that happened this week regarding the Alabama standard.
On Wednesday, Saban was on a recruiting Zoom call with an international recruit and his parents. He said he has never met any of them in person before, and the father has never even been to the United States to his knowledge.
However, the recruit's father told Saban that he knows what the Alabama Standard is, so Saban asked him how we would define it.
"He says, 'You guys do things right with all your might,'" Saban said.
So Saban challenged the team with that same thought.
"So I actually told the team that today," Saban said. "And I said, ‘Are you doing that? Can you honestly say that's what you're doing? Is that what you do every day? Is that what you've done all season long?"
According to Saban, the last 14 years of players have determined what people think of this program in helping to establish the Alabama standard. And the concept has resonated with players this week.
"I had players stand up this week and say, ‘I came here because of the Alabama standard,’ and challenge other people to say, 'Is that really what we're doing here?’” Saban said.
Even though he tried to warn that last week was a trap game, he says it wasn't because of the opponent, but because of their own mindset. This week, Mississippi State is coming off a bye week, but that's not something that matters to Saban. In the end, it comes down to what Alabama does, not the other team.
"Every game that we've ever played, it really comes down to what we do," Saban said. "Just like this last game, it came down to what we did. We control what we do. I don’t care if they had a month off, if we do what we’re supposed to do, we'll be fine.”
Saban said any team in the SEC West is capable of beating them and that Alabama is no longer viewed as an "elite team." No team can be overlooked, and that starts with this week's game in Starkville.
"Successful people are willing to do what unsuccessful people won't do," Saban said. "And that's something that we have to prove that we want to do.”
