Alabama cruised to a season opening win over Louisville on Saturday. The 37-point victory was an ominous sign for those schools looking to dethrone the Crimson Tide at the top of the college football mountain in 2018.
By Steve Wright
Next up is a home date with Arkansas State. Here are the three keys for this battle with the Red Wolves:
Cut down on the penalties
Alabama is going to have too much in the tank for the Red Wolves. The Sun Belt side had a big opening week win of their own – taking down Southeast Missouri State 48-21 – but the step up in class to take on Alabama is going to be mind blowing for Arkansas State. The only way that the Red Wolves are going to score on the Crimson Tide is through Alabama mistakes, mistakes that were all too common against Louisville.
Obviously a 37-point in is a great achievement on opening day – especially against a Power Five opponent – but Alabama was far from flawless against the Cardinals. The biggest bone of contention for Nick Saban will be that Alabama committed 10 penalties, with seven of those being assessed to the defense.
Sustaining drives for the opposition is a bad habit to get into, so Saban will look for improvement in this area against Arkansas State. Hopefully this initial rash of penalties was just the result of a young defense learning the college game, because Alabama cannot have penalty concerns as the season moves towards SEC play.
Continue to develop Tua Tagovailoa
It was hard to watch Tagovailoa against Louisville and come away anything other than impressed with the new Alabama starting quarterback. Jalen Hurts was an outstanding runner who led the Tide to a national title game last year, but the arm of Tagovailoa makes this Alabama team immeasurably more dangerous than the 2017 vintage.
Against the Cardinals Tagovailoa passed for 227 yards and two touchdowns while completing 12 of 16 passes. He also showed his ability on the ground, rushing for 26 yards and another score. He was great in the national title game, but his feel in the pocket and his ability to pass to all three levels of the football field have improved over the summer, a scary thought for fans of other SEC schools.
Against the Red Wolves we are looking for more development from Tagovailoa. He should (realistically) only be in the game for a half or so, but in that half he needs to show the same accuracy and poise he maintained as he was lighting up Louisville.
Stabilize the kicking game
It is strange that a Saban coached team would leave any area to chance, but the Alabama kicking game hasn’t been good recently. Kicking just 19 of 28 field goals in 2017 was frankly terrible, and Alabama got off to another rough start kicking the ball against Louisville.
Kicker Austin Jones missed a 27-yard field goal against the Cardinals, throwing in a missed extra point for good measure. It is one thing if the kicker is falling narrowly short of 50-yard bombs, but a 27-yard attempt should be automatic for a kicker at a top end Power Five program. It won’t hurt Alabama in this game, but there has to be an improvement in the kicking game so that Saban can trust his specialists when the game is on the line.
Be the first to comment