Tide turns to Bray Hubbard with starting safety Keon Sabb set to miss time

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer announced on Monday that starting Crimson Tide safety Keon Sabb will be “down for a while” due to a lower-extremity injury.

Sabb started last week’s game at Tennessee and played 30 snaps, but he left the game twice before being shut down for the rest of the contest. Replacing Sabb at safety alongside Malachi Moore was sophomore Bray Hubbard, who logged a career-high 51 snaps.

Alabama defensive coordinator Kane Wommack spoke highly of Hubbard’s fill-in performance.

“I thought Bray really did some great things in the game,” Wommack said. “Obviously had a huge third-down stop when we needed to get a three-and-out in that scenario and get the ball back to our offense. He made a hell of a play. I thought he did some really good things in the game.”

Hubbard first checked into the Tennessee game on the Vols’ fourth offensive possession in the second quarter. Sabb was able to return to the field but went down again later in the quarter and appeared unable to put much pressure on his right leg/foot. From that point, Hubbard finished the road loss in Knoxville in the back end of the Alabama secondary.

The 6-foot-2, 204-pound safety was second on the team in tackles (9) behind only linebacker Deontae Lawson. It was a new career-high for the second-year defender. Like Wommack said, he made a key stop on 3rd and 7 late in the fourth quarter to give the ball back to the Crimson Tide’s offense with 2:23 to go, but Alabama turned it over on downs.

A former 4-star recruit out of Ocean Springs, Mississippi, Hubbard’s reps this past week were his first extended playing time with the ones on defense. Hubbard was the No. 26 safety in the nation in the 2023 recruiting class, according to the On3 Industry Rankings, and will now get a chance to make the first start of his career with Sabb now sidelined.

“Bray’s been working hard for this opportunity,” said Alabama head coach Kalen DeBoer. “He worked, not just last week, but every week to be ready, and we had no doubt he would be come Saturday when he was called upon. He’ll go out there again this week. 

“Our team really believes in him. He does a lot of things on special teams. You can see it every day in practice. He’s been around the program, and now this is that time, that next-man-up mentality that we talk about, and that’s what it’s got to be. I know the high-level want-to that he has. I’m excited for his opportunity. 

“I love Keon to death and Keon’s a warrior, man. There’s more things I want to say about Keon and what he did to try to go out there and help our football team, but there’s next-man-up mentality, and I’m excited for the opportunity that Bray has in front of him.”

Hubbard was one of six safeties and 10 defensive backs who played first-team minutes against UT. Wommack echoed the approach DeBoer preaches for the team’s depth to be ready.

“Those guys have to be ready at a moment’s notice,” Wommack said. “You have a sense of urgency in practice. The guys that are rolling with the twos that, at any moment, they can step in and have a major impact on the game – certainly a game like this where you had a number of defensive backs that went down. 

“You can point to this and say, ‘Hey, this is why it’s so critical that you have the same level of urgency as the guy that may be going out with the starting defense, because at any given moment, you’re going to come in and have a tremendous impact on the game, on way or another, whether you’re prepared for it or not.’

“Certainly, I think our young guys, they seem to do that in practice. They have an urgency to get in. Bray Hubbard was a great example of that. Goes about his business workmanlike every single day and really prepares with an expectation that he’s going to go in, and he produced at a really high level. It’s certainly an opportunity for us to be able to point toward how critical practice habits have to show up one way or another in games.”

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