Alabama defensive lineman got his hands up and around a football in Alabama’s opener, but it slipped through his hands. He more than made up for it on Saturday when he caught, what has since officially been ruled a fumble, right out of the air and took off for the end zone.

Unfortunately for Allen, the end zone was 75 yards away.

“I was actually on the sideline…I looked up and saw it and I looked on the field and see [Allen],” linebacker Ryan Anderson said. “I’m like ‘damn that’s Jon.’ I see him running hard about 20 yards and I see him run outta gas and he’s was just waiting to get tackled. I thought he was going to get tackled and I know he did too and 75 yards later Jon had scored a touchdown- dang.”

Anderson and others were quick to joke about how long it took his 291 pound teammate to score in Alabama’s 48-43 win over Ole Miss. Anderson said he’d have to get on his case a little, but Allen won’t be the only guy to hear something from his teammates this week about that play.

Despite being escorted by three teammates, Allen almost didn’t make it. His teammates were a little too busy celebrating the turnover to notice an Ole Miss player had caught up and ultimately tackled Allen into the end zone.

“Yea me and Hootie [Jones] and Eddie [Jackson] went to movies last night, and Eddie was getting on to Hootie about that man,” Anderson said. “We were messing with Tim [Williams] too. Tim was punching something in the air. I don’t know what he was doing. He was running down the field with his hands up.”

Fellow linebacker Shaun Dion Hamilton said Allen’s escort took more grief than Allen did during the film review session. But his teammates were just happy to see one of their seniors score for the first time in almost a decade.

“Oh, yes [it meant a lot],” Hamilton said. “Jon said after the game that he hadn’t scored a touchdown since middle school.”

Allen wasn’t the only defender to score a touchdown for the Crimson Tide. In fact, he wasn’t even the only defensive lineman. Da’Ron Payne also grabbed a fumble and returned it three yards for the score, but couldn’t have made that play if Anderson hadn’t sacked Ole Miss quarterback Chad Kelly just outside of the end zone.

The assistance didn’t prevent the two teammates from going back and forth with each other this week.

“It was good for those two dudes, I support Jon [Allen], I’m not happy for Payne, he just told me I can’t talk to him till I score a touchdown,” Anderson said.

The linebacker said he actually got to Kelly because he could tell the offensive tackle assumed he wasn’t a concern. He decided to make him pay for that decision.

The sack also allowed him to keep his goal for the season intact.

“That was a big relief for me,” Anderson said. “Because I had said, I want to sack every quarterback I play this year at least once. I had missed him like three times, so it was good to finally get him down.”