Nick Saban goes in-depth on Alabama's preparations for crowd noise

No stone goes unturned around Nick Saban. During an appearance on “Hey Coach & The Nick Saban Show,” the Alabama head coach revealed how his team prepares for hostile territory.

“We have that noise going on [at practice],” Saban said. “It makes it hard for [the players] to communicate… Playing on the road is gonna be loud. It’s gonna be noisy and all that. If you look at the [Texas A&M] game, the plays that we made were made because we had poise and we played with confidence.”

Alabama’s poise paid off. The Crimson Tide left a rowdy Kyle Field with a 26-20 win over Texas A&M. Alabama’s confident play started behind center. In the win, Jalen Milroe tallied 321 passing yards and three touchdowns on a 63.4% completion percentage.

While Alabama ultimately put on a solid performance, it wasn’t without its flaws. The team committed 14 penalties for a loss of 99 yards in the win. Of course, this number could be astronomically worse without Saban’s preparation.

A new type of noise

Although Alabama won’t be on the road this week, the Crimson Tide will still deal with noise. Saban discussed how home-field noise affects Alabama differently than the away crowd.

“When we play at home, [I’m] trying to get the fans to make noise when the other team has the ball, so it creates problems for them,” Saban said. “Little did I realize that it creates a problem for the defensive players.

“They can’t hear because the crowd is affecting the offense but it’s also affecting the defense. When we play at home now, we have the [practice] noise for the defense, so they have to use hand signals. Everybody’s got to be able to get the signal from the sidelines.”

Nick Saban proves correct again

Per usual, Saban’s strategies are working. The Crimson Tide’s defense is allowing just 298.5 yards per game, the 19th-least in the country. Of course, Saban has had no shortage of time to figure out what works. The 71-year-old head coach revealed when he began implementing crowd noise in practice.

“Back in 2012,” Saban said. “We have a great environment when we play at home and we have great enthusiasm, great noise. People really do affect the offensive team. I started to see us especially when we were playing against fast-ball teams, we were having trouble communicating the defenses fast enough to the players.

“The offense is going fast and we can’t get lined up and we got guys that don’t even know what the call is. That’s when we started implementing the noise and the hand signals and making everybody nonverbal.”

Alabama will hear plenty of noise in its next matchup. On Saturday, Alabama will host Arkansas for its homecoming weekend. The teams will square off at noon ET. The game will be broadcast on ESPN.