Deontae Lawson, Jaylen Key considered 'very questionable' vs. Kentucky

Alabama defensive starters Deontae Lawson (ankle) and Jaylen Key (key) have been deemed “very questionable” for Saturday’s game at Kentucky, coach Nick Saban said on Thursday.

“They haven’t been able to practice much this week, so very questionable for this game,” said Saban on his radio show. “Hopefully, we can get them back in the near future. So it’s going to be an opportunity for some other guys to step up on our team in this particular game.”

He continued, “It’ll be really important because Kentucky is sort of a pro-style offense – lots of motions, lots of formations, lot of condensed formations that change things a little bit for players. 

“We really tried to work hard to make all these looks available to these guys, but we have to make sure we can execute and we’ve got to communicate well. And that’s the thing that young players don’t understand the importance of is how important it is to communicate so you can play together on defense and nobody’s really out of sync with how they’ve got to fit.” 

Lawson was slow to get to his feet after Tigers quarterback Jayden Daniels juked him near the Tide’s sideline. He was briefly on the bench before returning to the field before the end of the third quarter, but he limped to the locker room early in the fourth quarter. Lawson later emerged but was wearing a walking boot on his left foot while Jihaad Campbell and Trezmen Marshall finished the game. That duo also filled in for Lawson at Mississippi State.

Key was the first player to exit the field. In the first quarter, he stayed down and grabbed his left thigh before gingerly walking to the sideline with members of Alabama’s medical staff. After a visit to the medical tent on the home team’s sideline, Key walked to the locker room and didn’t return to the game, although he was seen on the sideline wearing street clothes.

Key was initially replaced at free safety by Kristian Story. But the Tide made some changes to its secondary in the second half, playing Terrion Arnold at Star, Trey Amos at left cornerback and Malachi Moore at free safety in its nickel defense. Should Key not play against Kentucky, we could again see Moore play safety and Amos be Alabama’s fifth defensive back.

Later Thursday night, Saban was asked about the team’s in the wake of the injuries.

“The healthier that we can stay down the stretch, the better we will be,” Saban said. “Some positions are more important than others. Like D. Lawson is the signal caller on defense, so he makes all the front adjustments, makes all the calls on the front. Well, his experience and his knowledge is missed a lot.

“The two safeties make all the calls in the secondary, so when you lose the starting safety who’s played in however many games we played so far this year, that experience gets replaced by someone who maybe doesn’t have quite the same experience. 

“So I guess what I’m trying to say is sometimes when you lose certain players at certain positions, that hurts more than other players. But we’ve been pretty fortunate this year. This is probably the game where will be a little more banged up than we’ve been in most.”

Alabama will play Kentucky on the road on Saturday, Nov. 11, at 11 a.m. CT on ESPN.

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