🏈 Bama notes and injury updates

[Alabama17Tide]

NOTEBOOK: Injury updates, SECCG records, more
Aaron Suttles | Beat Writer

ATLANTA | The architect of the SEC Championship Game Roy Kramer sat at the podium on the 25th anniversary of the game he created with former University of Alabama head coach Gene Stallings and former Florida coach Steve Spurrier — the coaches of the first title game that took place in Birmingham in 1992 — at his side.

The Crimson Tide won that game 28-21 to claim the SEC title and later claimed a national championship.

Stallings and Spurrier relived the epic battles from the 1990s — the pair met four times (1992, 1993, 1994, 1996). Stalling recalled the 1994 game that Florida pulled out by one point.

“We intercepted a pass to score and I’ve got to make a decision real quick whether to go for one or two,” Stallings said. “We haven’t gone for two and made it all year, hadn’t made it in practice, so we kicked the extra point.

“People said if we’d gone for two we’d have won the game, but I say there’s a difference between going for two and making two. I never convinced a soul of that.”

Injuries

Redshirt sophomore cornerback Marlon Humphrey did not play in the game. The talented defensive back injured his hamstring in the win over Auburn.

Junior linebacker Shaun Dion Hamilton injured his knee in the second quarter and did not return to the game. UA coach Nick Saban said he’s likely out for the season.

“He’ll be missed, but we have a lot of confidence in Rashaan (Evans), and he did a good job for us today," Saban said.

Evans made a key goal-line stop against Florida in the third quarter.

26th time

Alabama’s win gave the program its 26th conference championship, the most in the history of the league. The Crimson Tide won its first in 1933 under Frank Thomas. Paul W. “Beat” Bryant claimed 13 in his legendary 25-year career in Tuscaloosa.

Saturday night was Nick Saban’s fifth at the school.

Tick tock

When Florida opened the game with a touchdown drive, it was the first time since Oct. 22 that the UA defense allowed an opponent to cross the goal line.

That’s a total of four hours, 33 minutes and three seconds of game time.

When Minkah Fitzpatrick returned a Florida interception 44 yards for a touchdown in the first quarter it ended a stretch of four games that Alabama had gone without a non-offensive touchdown.

That’s a total of four hours, 20 minutes and 27 touchdowns of game time.

Alabama has 14 non-offensive touchdowns on the season.

SECCG notes

Senior linebacker Reuben Foster became just the fourth defensive player to claim MVP of the game, joining UA great Antonio Langham (1992), Ellis Johnson (Florida, 1994) and Tyrann Mathieu (LSU, 2011).

Foster finished the game with 11 tackles, 2.5 tackles for loss, and two sacks.

Alabama’s win gives the West eight straight over the East. The last time an Eastern team won the game was when Florida defeated Alabama in 2008.

Alabama’s 98-yard scoring drvie in the third quarter was the longest in the game’s history, bettering Florida’s 97-yard scoring drive in 2000.

Alabama’s 33-first half points was the most in the game’s history.

Alabama’s blocked punt was the first returned for a touchdown in the game’s history. It was also the second straight SEC Championship Game in which Alabama blocked a punt.

Jalen Hurts became the first true freshman quarterback to start for a team in the game’s history.

Captains

Senior linebacker Ryan Anderson, senior tight end O.J. Howard and senior defensive lineman Dalvin Tomlinson served as game captains.

Tidebits

Chris Saumels was recognized as an SEC Legend prior to the game. Samuels was a starting left tackle for Alabama’s 1999 SEC Championship-winning team…Alabama won the toss and elected to defer…Florida’s opening-drive touchdown was the first touchdown Alabama \allowed on an opening drive since the Ole Miss game.
TideSports.com - NOTEBOOK: Injury updates, SECCG records, more

 

[Alabama17Tide]

Playoff will determine Tide's prowess
Cecil Hurt | Sports Editor
ATLANTA

There are no more metaphors left for Alabama football.

America's cupboard of ways to explain the Crimson Tide is bare. That includes fierce bears, like an angry grizzly. Elephants are included. Star Wars fans have depleted the supply of Death Stars. The crushing snakes - pythons, anacondas, boa constrictors - all done. So are the vehicles, from Sherman tanks to bulldozers, or the natural phenomena from avalanches to tsunamis. All of history's fiercest hordes - Mongols, Huns, kindergarteners half-crazed on sugary Kool-Aid - have been applied to the Crimson Tide.

There aren't any more comparisons left to make, and there is no sense in coming to Atlanta and going to that cute metaphor shop in Virginia Highlands to find one because they've closed, their location turned into an organic coffee shop with philosophy-major baristas because the neighborhood only had three and needed another.

They're all gone. All that's left for Alabama now is one game, perhaps leading to another game, in which Alabama can either prove it is the multitude of mighty things which it has been called - or not.

As has been the near-certain case for months, Alabama is in the College Football Playoff as the No. 1 seed. The debate of "how good are they?" or "who have they played?" has been entertaining, or at least a great consumer of air-time and Internet space. But it was no more substantive than a breeze, because the answer was always going to be "we'll see in the playoff," just like last year (answer: better than anyone else) or the year before (answer: not as good as Ohio State.)

What was more interesting in Saturday's 54-16 pummeling of Florida wasn't what it "meant" in the big picture. It was more telling to view the small, single parts that comprised the whole, the plays that made Alabama so dominant. At this point, it's more fun to try and understand this team than to try and think of weekly grandiose labels.

For instance, Florida coach Jim McElwain made a great point about where "the depth piece," as he called it, makes Alabama "different."

"Where that talent, that team speed, really shows up is in special teams," McElwain said. "That was really a bad area for us tonight."

The Florida coach wasn't talking about the Crimson Tide kickers, neither of whom had a vintage evening (does anyone else think J.K. Scott is in a slump?) But Alabama blocked a punt, which was scooped up by a gifted running back (Joshua Jacobs) who happens to play special teams. Or another freshman - the combined youth making contributions to Alabama is a source of future SEC horror that will be examined in a different column - had two long punt returns and what hammers home McElwain's point is that Trevon Diggs isn't the original punt returner this season, and he was even better.

Thus things accumulate. Then the game becomes a matter of taking more and more risks, like trying to pound the ball in from the 2-yard line against the Alabama defense. That sequence, a third-quarter goal-line stand that effectively ended the game, began on a great, touchdown-saving tackle that stopped Florida at the 2. From there, running didn't work and passing didn't work and suddenly you are faced with having to do one or the other on fourth down, because a field goal might make matters look better but isn't really going to bring you closer to winning the game. So you end up, inescapably, with nothing.

That's fearsome, as fearsome as - well, there is nothing left to say. There's only waiting for another test, and then a final and then a grade. The question then won't be what to use as a comparison. If it happens, as it has so far, the only word will be "incomparable."
TideSports.com - Playoff will determine Tide's prowess

 

[Alabama17Tide]

Defense and special teams scores return in SEC championship
Tommy Deas | Staff

Alabama defensive back Minkah Fitzpatrick (29) celebrates his interception return for a touchdown during the first half of the SEC Championship Game in the Georgia Dome Saturday, December 3, 2016.
Gary Cosby Jr. | The Tuscaloosa News
ATLANTA – In each of the first eight games of the 2016 season, the University of Alabama scored at least one defensive or special teams touchdown.

Then, in the month of November, the non-offensive scoring stopped. The Crimson Tide kept winning and holding onto the No. 1 spot in the national rankings, but in four straight wins it failed to reach the end zone via defense or special teams.

The magic returned on Saturday in the Georgia Dame, with Alabama getting an interception return and a blocked punt return for touchdowns in a 54-16 victory over Florida in the SEC Championship Game.

"This group, we've scored more non-offensive touchdowns this year, I think, than any team I've ever been associated with," head coach Nick Saban said.

With the two against Florida, UA now has 14 non-offensive touchdowns on the season.

And they came when the Crimson Tide needed it, with the offense off to a sputtering start and the defense allowing Florida a touchdown on the Gators' opening drive of the game. Alabama trailed 7-3 when Minkah Fitzpatrick picked off an Austin Appleby pass and returned it 44 yards for a first-quarter score to give Alabama a three-point lead.

UA never surrendered that advantage, and picked off two more passes along the way.

The kicking game got involved when Derrick Gore, a backup running back, blocked a punt. Fellow running back Joshua Jacobs advanced it 27 yards for a touchdown.

"We practiced it all week," said Gore, who crashed in from his spot on the left end of the block unit. "Executing it felt good.

"I just blew my guy and I dove for it. It hit right on my hands. I couldn't find the ball at first. I looked back and I saw Josh Jacobs with the ball so I was said I might as well get a block in."

Jacobs did the rest.

"Basically we were going to get the ball," Jacobs said. "We got it and I heard the ball – I really didn't see it, I heard it – and I looked up and it was in the air and it was moving so slow. It felt like everything went into slow motion after that."

The blocked punt brought Alabama full circle in a way. UA blocked a punt for a safety against Florida in the 2015 SEC title game.

"It's just something that we work hard on all week," said Damien Harris, who blocked the punt last year. "That's just a part of our culture here. We just want to dominate all phases of the game."

There was more special teams excitement. After the blocked punt, Florida blocked Alabama's extra-point try and returned it for two points. Trevon Diggs had his first breakout game as a punt returner, running back three punts for 90 yards with a long return of 47 yards.

That's not to mention a botched fake punt by Florida, which Alabama failed to cash in for any points, missing a field goal after a three-and-out.

"I think there were some crazy things that happened in the game," Saban said.
TideSports.com - Defense and special teams scores return in SEC championship