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Nick Saban bemoans undisciplined penalties against Texas

Wade-Peeryby:Wade Peery09/10/22
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(Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

Top-ranked Alabama survived an unbelievably sloppy game against the Texas Longhorns on Saturday, thanks to the late game heroics of their signal-caller Bryce Young. The Crimson Tide were uncharacteristically sloppy and had 15 penalties through three quarters — the most in the Nick Saban era at Alabama. Despite all the penalties, Alabama was able to survive in a 20-19 win. Following the game, Crimson Tide head coach Nick Saban was obviously displeased with the penalties and discussed it in the post-game press conference.

“Well, I mean when you have a false start on offense because of crowd noise. If you jump offsides on defense that doesn’t have anything to do with crowd noise. Block a guy in the back, that doesn’t have anything to do with crowd noise. Alright, so, a lot of them are undisciplined penalties. But we have to be able to play and manage crowd noise if we’re gonna play in this league, in the SEC. Because every place we play’s gonna be like this. So, this is nothing big,” Saban said on Saturday.

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The Crimson Tide offense finally got things going in the fourth quarter, putting up 188 yards of offense, two more than the 186 yards of total offense they had through the first three quarters. The Longhorns battled until the very end and even took a 19-17 lead with 1:29 remaining in the fourth quarter after Texas kicker Bert Auburn drilled a 49-yard kick. But as he has done so many times in the past, last year’s Heisman Trophy winner, Alabama quarterback Bryce Young put the Tide offense on his back and drove them all the way down the field. Crimson Tide kicker Will Reichard drilled a 33-yard field goal with 10 seconds remaining in the game to lift Alabama to the victory. It was an impressive performance overall by the Texas defense, which gave the Tide offensive line plenty of problems throughout the afternoon.

The win marked the 19th consecutive 2-0 start to the season for head coach Nick Saban, continuing the nation’s longest streak. Don’t look for him or the Crimson Tide to do any sort of major celebrating following that game. They survived Saturday, but clearly have plenty of issues to address.