Alabama fans hold their team to a high standard, and understandably so.
It is a standard that Nick Saban set for himself and his team through years of championships and dominance. The only problem with such a standard is the fans demand it weekly — in perpetuity — instead of abiding by the ebb and flow of college football, complete with its ups and its downs.
This past weekend’s 14-13 victory over Arkansas was a strong point of frustration for the fans, especially after it followed a mistake-filled, narrow loss at Ole Miss the week prior. Offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin is already being fired on message boards and Twitter, as is special teams coach Bobby Williams and every punt returner. But Saban has a problem with this response, especially coming off of a win, albeit a sloppy one.
“Everybody’s got such a high expectation for what our team should be, I was just happy to see our players be happy about playing a game and winning,” Saban said, his tone rising with every word. “And it really, sort of, if you want to know the truth about it, pisses me off when I talk to people that have this expectation like they’re disappointed that we only won the game 14-13 and in the way we played. Really, that’s frustrating. You wanna talk about something that’s frustrating? That’s frustrating, to me, for our players, who played with a lot of heart in the game.”
And it’s not just Saban and his coaching staff who hear the criticism. The players, like offensive lineman Austin Shepherd, also feel that pressure from fans and are tasked with bearing the standard every week.
“Everyone wants us to win 60-0, and that’s just not possible,” Shepherd said. “Arkansas is really, really good. They’re probably the team that’s gotten the best out of this league. I mean, everyone should be happy with a win, and you can’t win every game by 100 points so you just got to be happy with this one.”
Saban is using this game as a learning experience, and he would much rather teach with a close win than a loss.
“It is frustrating that we make these mistakes, but our focus as coaches needs to be on what do we need to teach the players so that they can do it better, and do it more consistently,” Saban said. “Regardless of who makes the error, it has the same effect, same impact on the game and on the team. We have to help each other overcome these things.”
The mistakes, turnovers, penalties and lack of execution were undeniable, but the team showed a resiliency that it lacked against Ole Miss. The players supported each other after the mistakes and grew tighter as a unit, showing emotion and drive.
“Blake didn’t do the quarterback sneak right, but I really saw our players help him and support him,” Saban said. “Because he made a mistake and that was good. I think we need that on our team. Some of that has been missing on our team. When Landon Collins intercepts the ball at the end of the game, I haven’t seen that much emotion out of our team for a long time.”
Saban is probably right to stand up for his players and coaches, but there were plenty of justifiable reasons for fans to be critical of their performance against Arkansas. This is a different Alabama team, of course, but the program that Saban has built — the one with all of the titles and five-star recruits — should perform better against an unranked opponent.
And the first four games of the season gave fans an expectation of this team that it just hasn’t matched in its last two games for some reason or another.
But at the end of it all, Alabama did come out on top. By one point or 100, it’s a win, and it could have been much worse.
Follow Jonathan on Twitter @Jonathan_Biles
