Turnovers leave Saban seething

October 08, 2007

By Ken Rogers

Alabama head coach Nick Saban has twice described turnovers blamed on quarterback John Parker Wilson as “not winning football.“
The coach went over both plays during Monday’s news conference—Wilson’s fumble inside his own 10 against Florida State and the quarterback’s forced pass that was tipped and intercepted late in Saturday’s victory over Houston.
“I think you gotta be smart,“ Saban said. “The first read on that play was open and the decision should have been made to throw the ball to the guy. We create our own issues by starting to scramble when we really don’t have a big pass rush. Then when we get about three-quarters of the way scrambling we decide to throw it to the check-down—which would have been OK earlier in the down, but especially in that situation during the game you gotta be smart and make a smart decision and a judgment as to what we do. We certainly don’t want to give them the ball back there.
“So, there are those out there who can probably say ... we needed to get a first down in that situation to shrink the clock, that we should have ran it. And I agree with all those people. Because the pass didn’t work. They just didn’t have to make that decision before it didn’t work. If I’d have known what was gonna happen on the play, we would have ran it. So everybody that disagrees with us out there can rest assured that had I known, I’d have done exactly what they wanted us to do.“
The Florida State situation led to the Seminoles touchdown.
“It’s third down and 15, we’re backed up, looking at a three-man rush,“ Saban recalled. “Fundamentally you should never be running with one hand on the ball, scrambling with one hand on the ball. Guy strips it out of his hand. They dropped eight guys, we threw a vertical route, they cover it, throw it away or check down, get rid of it and we’ll punt.
If every offensive series ends with a kick — and maybe you’ve heard me say this before — whether it’s an extra point, a field goal or a punt, that ain’t all bad. ‘Cause all the rest of the stuff that happens isn’t worth a darn.“