Nick Saban defends Alabama players, calls on leadership from coaches, players

During last week’s game against Tennessee, Alabama looked shaky out of the gate. Nick Saban pointed to a few factors in that, but defended his players.

Saban, speaking with reporters during his Monday press conference, said the Crimson Tide didn’t look like themselves last week at Neyland Stadium. He said they looked flat and probably made a few too many mistakes.

But mistakes aren’t always bad because the players can learn from them. That, Saban said, needs to be the coaching staff’s focus going forward through the rest of the season.

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“Look, I think that our players all want to win,” Saban said. “Regardless of how everybody feels, we feel worse. The players are out there competing, they’re playing hard. Maybe not always playing smart, maybe making too many errors that we need to fix. And as coaches, we need to help them fix them, teach them. They need to learn from the lessons that — learning occurs best when you make a mistake. But you’ve got to take advantage of that. I think it’s important for our players to get that. … You want to have great energy and you want to be loose. I thought we were tight, especially starting the game.

“Coming out of the locker room, our players always chant. They weren’t chanting. I said, ‘Why ain’t you guys chanting? What’s up with that?’ It’s not that they don’t want to do it. It’s not that they’re not trying. I just think we’ve got to get our focus in the right place and our psychological disposition in the right place.”

Nick Saban: Competing in football is no different than playing a pick-up basketball game

Saban also made a comparison to a pick-up basketball game and the need to keep battling to beat whoever you’re playing against. But it comes down to having fun competing, and that’s something he wants to instill in his players following the 52-49 loss to Tennessee.

“Look, when you compete, it’s fun to compete when you play the next play,” Saban said. “It’s no different than playing a pick-up basketball game, aight? He’s got the ball, I’ve got to guard him. I’ve got the ball, I’ve got to beat him. That’s how you play. That’s how you compete. You have fun. Sometimes he wins, sometimes you win, aight? But you’re having fun doing it. You’re competing. That’s what’s important. You can’t worry about the outcome.

“You can’t sit there all tensed up because you’re afraid the guy’s going to shoot a three on you. You’ve got to play the play, and go play the next play if he does make a three. It’s just so much more fun that way. Not looking at the scoreboard, not looking at results, not worrying about results, not being fearful of what’s going to happen if something bad happens or if we lose a game. Just go play. Compete. And then, when the game’s over, if we do that and we do it well as a collective group, we can live with the results. It’s our job, it’s my job to help these players get to that point.”