That word can be used now.
“I think this is as close to Alabama football in terms of what we want to try to get from our players, in terms of the effort, the toughness, the emotional excitement, the execution that we got for the most part throughout the game,” Alabama coach Nick Saban said.
Alabama’s defense was hyped up during the 59-0 blowout of Texas A&M on Saturday. It had nine tackles for 32 yards lost, including six sacks for 27 yards. The Crimson Tide had one quarterback hurry.
“I think the thing that saved us early on before we could adjust was that we did get good pass rush,” Saban said. “They only had five guys to block and we hit them with a couple of pressures. I think that the best thing that we did, one of the keys in the game, was affecting the quarterback with four guys rushing. I think that was a real key to the game. I think the secondary did a good job of disguising, better than we ever have before when we’ve played these guys. We didn’t have to put an extra guy in the box to stop the run. That certainly helped the pass defense.”
There were five pass breakups. Senior safety Nick Perry had two. Aggies quarterback Kenny Hill threw one interception, a line drive that was picked off by junior linebacker Reggie Ragland at the line of scrimmage.
Texas A&M came in with a high-powered offense, but the Crimson Tide shut down the Aggies in the shutout.
“I thought Alabama played very well today,” Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin said. “They played like Alabama plays. They were better physically, particularly in the first half.”
At halftime, Texas A&M had no yards rushing on nine tries. The passing game that had been so heavily featured this season had 51 yards. The Aggies couldn’t get a first down until the second quarter; they finished with only eight.
The Crimson Tide held the Aggies to 172 total yards of offense. It was the fourth time this season that Alabama held its opponent to fewer than 300 yards of offense.
“We’ve been working on it all week. Coach Bo [Davis], Coach Saban and Coach [Lance] Thompson all put a big emphasis on playing defense the Alabama way,” said Jonathan Allen, sophomore defensive lineman. “I’m glad that we did what we’ve been taught and coached to do. It was just a great team effort.”
