Saban: Bama has ‘smiled’ at adversity this year

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Even before the start of this season, which was anything but rousing for Alabama‘s football team, some of the players came up with an idea for a T-shirt.

Quarterback Jalen Milroe was at the football complex Wednesday and was sporting the shirt, which has the acronym “LANK” displayed across the front.

“It’s something me and Terrion [Arnold] thought about in the offseason — Let All Naysayers Know — and we wanted something that would push us and motivate us, and it’s still pushing us,” said Milroe, who became the first quarterback in Alabama history last week to pass for three touchdowns and rush for three touchdowns in a 49-21 road win over Kentucky.

“Everybody knows we didn’t play to the Alabama standard those first few games, but we never quit pushing. A lot of people might have given up on us, but we never did. You look at the players on this team. Look at their faces. There’s a lot more left out there for us.”

Alabama (9-1, 7-0 in the SEC) has won eight straight games since a 34-24 home loss to Texas in Week 2. In Week 3, the Crimson Tide benched Milroe and won a sloppy 17-3 decision at South Florida, a game that was tied at 3-3 until the final five minutes of the third quarter.

“A lot of teams go the other way when something like that happens. This one didn’t,” Alabama coach Nick Saban told ESPN on Wednesday. “They stayed together, did the things we needed to do to get better, and we can still get better. That’s what you love seeing in a team, that when you go through some hard times and you’re not playing very well, that’s when you take a step back and ask yourselves, ‘How do we fix this?’ This team has done that at every turn this season.”

As much as anything, Saban said he has enjoyed seeing this team have fun.

“And that’s why it’s made it such a fun team to coach. It’s nice to come into the locker room after a win and see smiles on kids’ faces and not just relief,” Saban said.

The No. 8 Crimson Tide, who step outside the SEC to face Chattanooga on Saturday before traveling to Auburn on Nov. 25 in the regular-season finale, have clinched their seventh trip to the SEC championship game in the past 10 years and will face No. 1 Georgia on Dec. 2 in Atlanta.

Alabama’s unparalleled success under Saban has made for some gaudy expectations every year, this year included.

“It’s like people are watching and waiting for the first stumble or the first loss, and then it’s like, “OK, you can forget about Alabama,'” said Milroe, who has accounted for 10 touchdowns in his past two games. “We always knew we were going to be a work in progress, starting with me.”

Saban said there have been seasons at Alabama where it was difficult to enjoy success. It has been the opposite this season, and he said that has shown up in the way this team has approached practice and games.

“Maybe it’s because we started out badly and everybody sort of kicked us off to the curb,” Saban said. “But this team from the very start always had the right attitude. We weren’t very good in the beginning, but we had the right attitude and they just kept that and they kept showing resiliency and overcoming adversity. I mean, individually and collectively as players, they’ve continued to develop.

“The expectations don’t really bother me. It’s not like I walk around going, ‘Oh s—, everybody thinks I’m supposed to win every game,’ because I think like that. That pressure’s on myself, but it was hard sometimes to watch how it impacted the players. But this group has been fun. They have fun playing, and that makes it fun being around them and fun to coach.”

Saban is 44-6 in his past 50 games against SEC opponents, and the Tide have continued to recruit at an elite level. But they’ve also lost 17 players to the NFL draft over the past two years, and some of their depth has taken a hit thanks to the transfer portal. In some ways, Saban thinks there might have been more players, similar to Milroe, coming into this season feeling as if they had something to prove.

“I think that has some impact on guys, too,” Saban said. “When you go into the season and you have 15 to 20 guys that have NFL grades and four or five of them have first-round grades before the season ever starts, there’s a different kind of pressure, expectation or whatever that guy puts on himself that makes it harder for him.

“On this team, we have a few guys that probably have first-round grades, but they became that by the way they played this year.”

Saban, in keeping with the fun theme, acknowledged that he has done a few things with this team that he has never really done in the past. Case in point: He’s constantly reminding his players to conduct themselves with class, and one of the players jokingly called him out on it and told Saban that he cusses in meetings and “that ain’t showing class.” Saban vowed to pay $5 every time he cussed in meetings going forward.

“So I hear they’ve got a pot downstairs,” Saban joked.

Milroe said not to be fooled because Saban “still has that same edge to him.” But what has made it work for everyone, Milroe said, is that this is a player-led team.

“We don’t accept mediocrity and hold each other accountable, so the hope is that Coach Saban has to yell less,” Milroe said. “But he’s still going to yell.”