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Nick Saban further explains quarterback decisions before, after USF

1918632_10206777287683070_1367905321192383146_nby:Charlie Potter•09/21/23•

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Alabama coach Nick Saban
Nick Saban (Courtesy of Alabama Athletics)

In his latest sitdown with ESPN senior writer Chris Low, Alabama head coach Nick Saban said the reason he played Tyler Buchner and Ty Simpson in last week’s game at South Florida was he “promised the three quarterbacks he would give them all chances in games.”

“That was it. Nothing else,” Saban told ESPN. “I’ve got confidence in Jalen (Milroe). I believe in him. The one thing that we’ve always talked about is you make enough good plays, but you’ve got to eliminate the devastating plays, the ones that are killers. It happened twice in the Texas game, but I think he’s learned from it.”

Buchner started the Week 3 road game in Tampa but struggled in his first meaningful minutes in an Alabama uniform before being replaced in the second quarter by Simpson, who finished the 17-3 win over the non-conference opponent. Jalen Milroe, the Crimson Tide’s starter in the first two games of the season, did not play against the Bulls but was on the sideline.

Saban said Milroe was “initially frustrated” when he found out Buchner and Simpson would play at USF, but the redshirt sophomore showed leadership during last week’s game as he supported his teammates while not playing. That led to Saban opening his press conference on Monday by naming Milroe the starting quarterback for this week’s game against Ole Miss.

“In the end, I think all of it will be helpful to Jalen, and we’ve got to play better around him and put him in positions to do what he does best,” Saban said. “I’ve been pleased with the way he’s responded.”

Milroe, the offense and the rest of Alabama’s 2023 team will look to bounce back after a Week 2 loss to Texas and a sub-pair outing against a USF team that only won 11 games last season. It won’t be easy against an Ole Miss team that plays fast on offense, has a mobile quarterback in Jaxson Dart and plays for a coaching staff that is familiar with the Crimson Tide.

But just like he has all week, Saban expressed confidence in his team prior to SEC play.

“We’ll respond,” Saban said. “We’ve got a better team than the way we played last week. I don’t know if we’ve got a good enough team to beat Ole Miss or anybody else we play, but we’ve got a better team than we played last week. Texas has a damn good team, probably one of the best five teams in the country and we were ahead of them in the fourth quarter.

“I like this team. I like this group. They’ve worked hard. They’ve got a good attitude about things. We just got to execute better and pay better attention to detail, and we’ve got some areas on our team that need to play better.”

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