Everything Kalen DeBoer said after Alabama's 31-17 loss at Florida State

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Alabama opened the 2025 season with a 31-17 loss to Florida State on Saturday, August 30. After the Week 1 road loss, head coach Kalen DeBoer spoke to reporters.

Here is everything he said at Doak Campbell Stadium.

DeBoer’s opening statement…

“Had some opportunities to get back in the game there. The name of the game is that we can’t be hesitant early on, OK. We got to start faster in all ways. Yes, I know we went down and scored first drive, pieced some plays together and found a way to put the end zone. But just the next couple series, both sides of the ball, we got to do a better job, we got to do a better job. And we had opportunities there in the second half, but we gave them life. We gave them life, we gave them hope and confidence in the first half there. And then what it does is it puts you in a spot where you got to be perfect. You’re playing from behind and you got to be perfect. And the stress on the guys to make every play becomes greater and greater.

“And I choose to believe we got a good football team, but we can’t play on our heels. We’re not gonna be what we think we can be, what we want to be, if that’s the case. And so, again, that falls on everyone. I don’t just point the finger at the players. Gave the, I know the deep, both sides of the ball — I mean, you kind of know what you’re gonna see going into the game. But with new coordinators, but we talked in the locker room. There’s no excuse about what happened. We step on the football field, they step on the football field, and we got to play ball, we got to play our style of ball.

“And last year isn’t this year. And it’s gonna be an uphill climb for us, but you can’t think of it in the big scope of things. You got to focus on the moment. And the next moment is what happens tomorrow. And we’ll find out, we’ll find out. We’ve talked all along about chemistry on this team, and talked about how close we are and how hard we worked. Doing a lot of the right things, but we’ll find out, we’ll find out if that sticks.”

DeBoer on Ryan Williams’ status…

“He got a concussion.”

DeBoer on Florida State’s success in the run game…

“You knew going in with the quarterback runs that it was gonna be a challenge. He did a nice job. I thought the first half he was keeping some drives alive, even on passing downs that weren’t called runs. They did a nice job going sideline to sideline. They did a lot of things with those fly sweeps that we worked on and prepared for. Guys got to get 1-on-1, get in space, got to find a way to get them on the ground. Use your leverage and you’ve got to find a way to trust your buddies around you, that they’re in pursuit. They were piecing together first downs that kept them on the field, they hit the explosive down the sideline in the first drive. They’re gonna make plays too, and I can live with that. But we’ve got to respond. 

“And just coming out in the second half, I thought we settled in other than the one play. And I really felt third quarter going into fourth quarter, I thought defensively, we kind of got our feet underneath of us, had kind of an idea of what they’re really trying, the rhythm of what they do offensively and how we call plays. And they do some funky things with the snap count and all that kind of stuff. And it kind of keeps our guys kind of wondering what’s next, and not in our own rhythm. I think we got through that after the first half. But then we give them the run, we give them the play, and we kind of let them out with the penalty at the end, the late hit. And we can’t live in the gray area. We’ve talked about that all season long. We can’t live in the gray area. It isn’t just about that play. It’s other things that we gotta do, but that certainly adds to it.”

DeBoer on not being able to finish drives in FSU territory…

“That’s probably, I know from a frustration standpoint, that’s the thing that is frustrating. You win the game, and you look at those drives, and you’re saying, ‘Hey, there’s first downs that you’re piecing together. You’re giving yourself chances.’ But when you lose the game, you look at it, and you gotta understand that there’s gotta be a competitive stamina.

“It was a long drive, the first one, and it was hard work. You had to execute, you had to make some big plays, and you did it. Now, you gotta go back out there, and you gotta do it again. You gotta stack play after play after play. And we’d have a negative play or that missed opportunity. There were some opportunities out there that we either didn’t give ourselves a chance to make or just missed. We’re not gonna live in regret, not gonna live in regret. We gotta go fix it and be better because of it and evaluate the film and move on.”

DeBoer on how Ty Simpson played in his first start…

“He’s gotta just trust his reads and just cut it loose sometimes. Just let it fly. He can make the throws. Just let it fly, and throw on rhythm, throw on time. There might have been a time or two where they got in his face a little quick. That’s gonna happen. That’s football. But just let it fly. Then just some decision-making there in certain critical moments. That’s the things he’s gonna learn from. 

“He’s given everything he has. But that’s where I know he’s in the locker room, wishing that there was some things he would have done different. But there are other guys, too. So we gotta catch the ball for him once in a while. It’s a full team sport. It’s a whole offensive unit that has to move the ball up and down the field. Yeah, the quarterback’s the trigger man, but everyone’s gotta do their part to help the guy out.”

DeBoer on the reasoning behind rotating freshmen…

“At tight end, I mean, Kaleb’s the next guy up. That’s really what it’s about. So you got Josh, and Danny’s been down again here the last little bit. You go through the depth chart, got another ding or two in the tight end room that pulled some guys out for some plays, and some guys that have been out during camp, Marshall, a little bit limited. So that’s where we’re at in the depth chart there. So yeah, there’s gonna be young guys, and it’s what the world we’re in right now. And so we got some older guys, and then all of a sudden, there’s a gap, and younger guys gotta step on the field and play.

“Yeah, we go down the depth chart further on the defensive tackle interior list. And London has done some nice things as a freshman for us in practice, and some consistency there that we trust him. He got to go out there and get thrown to the wolves, whatever you want to call it. Yeah, that was certainly the case, but that’s where we’re at in the rotation.”

DeBoer on what changed for Alabama’s run game…

“I’m trying to think of the runs in the first half, or the first quarter, first drive. I feel like they were very similar to some of the one that we had in the fourth quarter. As far as the holes, the seams and getting through the first level. I think there were hard yards in the first quarter that we did have. We were able to stay ahead of the chains and continue to do that. The game kind of — going into the third quarter, for sure — you’re trying to be patient, but you know those possessions are counting down on you. 

“But again, I thought we did a good job staying committed to it, as we went into the fourth quarter there. Again, hitting some plays up the middle. There needs to be a better consistency. We didn’t have any explosives, that I can think of, that we need to have. It’s hard to put drives together, as we saw, when we don’t have chunk yardage plays. They hit their explosives at times, the reverses and things like that, the ball down the field there on the first drive. We had some explosives, too, but most of them were in the air.”

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