Henry To'oTo'o on adjusting as a transfer: I no longer consider myself a transfer

With the impact Henry To’oTo’o made last season at Alabama, the average viewer might not have known he transferred from Tennessee. In fact, that’s his mentality as he gets ready for his senior season.

“I don’t consider myself a transfer anymore,” To’oTo’o said. “I’m about to get a degree from the University of Alabama, so I’m super excited about that. Being a part of this family.

“The bond that we have as a team, the character that we’re all building as a defense, as an offense and as a whole entire team, it’s something that you have to create to be a good team. It’s something that you have to have to be able to perform how you want to perform on the field.”

Last season — his first after leaving the Volunteers — To’oTo’o put up the best numbers of his career, totaling 111 tackles and 4.0 sacks to help anchor the Crimson Tide defens. He settled into the scheme nicely, and said he feels “great” schematically this year.

But he spoke more about his relationships with his teammates and how much they’ve meant to him during his time in Tuscaloosa so far.

“The bond that I have with the players, it’s beyond the charts than I can ever explain,” To’oTo’o said. “Love every single player on this team to death, would do anything for anybody. That’s something that when you come here, you create through the things that you do every single day, through the practices, the hard work, fall camp. Being able to be here every single day, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for these players.”

Nick Saban addresses Alabama’s hunger following loss in National Championship Game to end 2021 season

It’s not often that Alabama doesn’t find itself atop the college football mountaintop. That’s especially been true of Nick Saban’s tenure in Tuscaloosa. The Crimson Tide have won six titles since he arrived. But last year, Saban’s group fell short of a title — and he hopes his players are motivated to chase a title this season.

“I’d like for players to have that kind of edge for who they want to be, how they want to play, to be the best players that they can be regardless of what happened last year,” Saban said. “Whether they won and had success like we did the year before (or) whether we lost and now there’s a lot of humiliation in terms of pride in performance and not being able to finish the way we would like. I think all those things are motivating factors for players.”