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Do comments about Alabama's dynasty dying affect Nick Saban?

1918632_10206777287683070_1367905321192383146_nby: Charlie Potter09/13/23Charlie_Potter

Since the clock hit zero in Alabama’s 34-24 loss to Texas on Saturday, and even before, there were statements made about the Crimson Tide’s dynasty under Nick Saban being over.

Since 2007, when Saban arrived in Tuscaloosa, Alabama has won six national championships, and played for three more, as the top program in the sport. But with Georgia winning the last two titles and the Tide playing uncharacteristic football in its most recent losses, some are ready to declare Saturday night’s loss to the Longhorns as the time of death of a dynasty.

While that is most likely premature, do comments like that from pundits, fans and even former players like quarterback Greg McElroy affect Saban? He was asked that on Wednesday.

“My approach is try to play to a standard, try to get our players to play to a standard,” said Saban on the SEC coaches media teleconference. “When we don’t play to a standard, I don’t need anybody else to criticize. I’ve got pride in performance just like everybody else in this organization. So we wanna try to get it right. We wanna try to do everything we can to get people to play to a standard and that’s what we’re focused on.

“My standard comes from within me, not from some external motivation that comes from someplace else. I haven’t even heard or read any of those things because I don’t really pay a lot of attention to it. I do pay a lot of attention to what we’re doing here internally and how we can get it fixed so that our players have a better chance to be successful.”

Alabama (1-1) lost its first regular-season game to a non-conference foe since 2007, but there is still plenty of football ahead of the Crimson Tide, starting with this weekend’s trip to Tampa, Fla., to take on the South Florida Bulls (2:30 p.m. CT on ABC). But there are also plenty of areas that Alabama has to clean up, on both sides of the football, to calm the overreaction.

Much like their coach, UA’s players have blocked out criticism of the team after the loss.

“Me personally, I’m not really big into reading social media or reading what other people post,” said Alabama cornerback Kool-Aid McKinstry. “After a game like that, me personally, I haven’t even really been on social media to see what the media’s been saying, what people have been saying about us, what former players have been saying about us because, to be honest, there is nothing we can do about it. The game’s over with. 

“All we can do is learn from our mistakes and move forward about it and just acknowledge our mistakes, go over it with Coach and just move on, be a better team.”

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