Nick Saban reveals his message to Jalen Milroe, Alabama QBs after Texas loss
Alabama‘s 34-24 loss to Texas last Saturday has been looming over the Crimson Tide all week as they head into their Week 3 matchup against USF. Quarterback Jalen Milroe didn’t have his strongest showing versus the Longhorns, as he was sacked five times and threw two interceptions.
Head coach Nick Saban joined ‘The Pat McAfee Show’ on Thursday and was asked about his message to Milroe following the loss, to which Saban gave a detailed analysis of the quarterback position, their responsibilities, and the role of their supporting cast.
“I think that the quarterback position probably always gets a little too much credit when things go well and they probably also get a little bit too much criticism when things don’t go well. That’s sort of the nature of the beast, and everybody needs to understand that,” Saban said. “But I think the quarterback position is like every other position, if you want security in your position you have to play well. And that’s what every position on our team and every player on our team, that should be their mindset.”
Milroe completed just 51.9% of his passes for 255 yards along with a pair of touchdown passes to go along with his pair of interceptions. He had a much better performance in Week 1 versus Middle Tennessee State, and will strive to mimic that stronger showing in Week 3 as the point guard of Alabama’s offense.
“So what do you have to do to correct the things you didn’t do well and give yourself a better chance to create value for yourself in terms of how you play, but also that’s going to benefit the team. And I think one thing about the quarterback position is you gotta be the point guard, you’re the point guard first, you’re gonna distribute the ball each and every play and you’re not the shooting guard,” Saban explained. “So you don’t have to worry about making plays or forcing plays, you have to worry about distributing the ball to the right guy and not turning it over.”
There’s no doubt that criticism has come in Milroe’s direction following the Texas loss, but Saban made it clear that his entire unit as a whole on offense needs to improve and do a better job as a supporting cast to Alabama’s signal caller.
“So if there was one thing that we would evaluate by the offense last week, and this is not just about the quarterback it’s the whole the whole offense, because if the people around you don’t play well quarterback may be the most difficult position in ball to play, in any kind of ball. So we gotta get the people around the quarterback to play better and we can’t have so many drive stoppers,” Saban said.
Alabama definitely looked uncharacteristic of their traditional style of play under Saban on Saturday, with a multitude of penalties and mental errors that Saban remembers all too well from last weekend.
“We had six penalties on offense, two of them negated touchdowns, so that’s six things. We had two turnovers, that’s eight. We had one dropped ball, that’s nine. And we had five sacks, so that’s like 14 or 15 what I call drive stopping type plays, and one guy was not responsible for all of those things,” Saban said. “So the entire group needs to function more effectively on a more consistent basis because we can’t have all those drive stoppers.”
Saban will surely be looking for improved play from his quarterback in Week 3, but from the rest of his offense and defense as well as they take on USF ON Saturday at 3:30 p.m. ET in a game airing on ABC.