Alabama Football: Saban at SEC Media Days

It's just not SEC media days until Nick Saban shows up. Over 900 members of the media and hundreds of Crimson Tide fans packed into the Wynfrey Hotel in Hoover, Al to hear the coach speak.

Saban spoke to the media on a number of topics, including:

On Les Miles comments  - that Alabama hadn't fared so well against Louisiana teams:

"He told the truth" Saban said, "We need to earn the respect we get."

On this years senior class:

"There are only nine," Saban said, "but it's up to them to create the direction for the younger players."

On what he expects from this years incoming freshman and how many will play:

"It's up to them," he said. "They create the expectations. Before this, they had tremendous expectations because of recruiting services. But it's up to them. We'll have some on offense, as many as five or six on defense with the linebackers and the secondary."

On the off-field issues he has faced at Alabama:

"We're never pleased when an individual embarrasses the organization. When one fails -- or we fail them -- everyone knows about it. But what you don't see is the 25 other guys who have done a great job of improving their chances of being successful. We have many players who have made significant progress."

On playing more big non- conference games:

"I know there has been some speculation about us playing Virginia Tech next year, But we're having difficulty with our schedule getting that worked out. But philosophically, we'd like to play one (major) non-conference game each year."

Michael Hicks is a columinst for Bleacher Report. He will be covering SEC Media Days you can send in questions or comments to [e-mail].