Nick Saban reveals the mindset Alabama must approach Chattanooga with

With the SEC West locked up, Alabama could very easily overlook their next two contests in some sense, specifically this weekend’s in the non-conference against Chattanooga. However, Nick Saban doesn’t want the Crimson Tide to falter against the Mocs in a way that they can’t afford to for their season.

Saban looked ahead at ‘Bama’s next matchup against UTC during his press conference on Monday. He started by crediting their upcoming opponent for the campaign that they’ve had so far.

“Chattanooga, obviously, has had a really good season. Their players play hard, they compete well,” Saban said. “Rusty Wright has done a really good job there. I think they’re like second in their league. 7-3, only lost two games in their league.”

“Like always, this is a great opportunity for these guys to play in a game that they probably dream about,” said Saban.

With that said, Saban turned his attention to his own team. While Alabama will be a massive favorite on Saturday, he hopes his players won’t play in a way that, even in a very likely victory, will ruin the progress that they’ve generated over the past month and a half.

“For our team? This is either a game that you focus on correctly, you go out and practice and prepare correctly. You build on the momentum that you’ve improved with over the last weeks. That helps you get better for what’s coming up in the future. If you don’t do that, you don’t have a good showing? You sort of lose your rhythm,” explained Saban.

“Rhythm is a little bit like momentum. Sometimes, when you lose momentum in a game, it’s hard to get it back,” Saban said. “You’ve always go to play the next play and keep answering the bell. That’s really kind of how we need to approach this game in terms of what our focus is and how we want to continue to improve as a team.”

Again, this will, in every likelihood, end up as Alabama’s tenth win of the season ahead of The Iron Bowl and a date with Georgia in Atlanta on December 2nd. Even so, Saban won’t allow the Tide to take any steps back in this game that could end up costing them in those final two.

“If you’re going to peak at the right time? You can’t have peaks and valleys. You’ve got to keep going in the right direction,” said Saban. “That’s what we want to get our players to focus on this week in practice in preparation for this game.”