Scalding Hot Nick Saban and Alabama Are Ohio State's Worst Nightmare
ATLANTA — Coaching is an ego-driven profession, and while every head coach has a specific style in which he goes about his business, only the best know the proper time to put their ego aside.
Alabama head coach Nick Saban is the best coach in America at doing just that, and the job he's done with the 2014 Crimson Tide make this his best coaching job during his eight-year tenure at the Capstone.
He knew he needed to make his offense more dynamic so that, in the age of "fastball" offenses that focus on pace, his team could not only get into shootouts, but win them.
Enter offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin and and quarterback Blake Sims. The duo found out during the second quarter of the 33-23 win over West Virginia in the season opener that Sims thrives with tempo, and implemented more and more of that as the season progressed.
"[Sims] is the reason that we do it, because it's what he does best, and the rest of our players really kind of fit in that too with the kind of team we have," Saban said after the 42-13 SEC Championship Game win over Missouri. "So it's worked out great for us. And if we didn't do it, I don't think we'd be here where we are right now."
Flexibility wins.
Saban didn't change his entire philosophy. Alabama's goal is, and always will be, to run to set up the pass, play disciplined and work off play-action.
It still is. Saban just nudged the pendulum ever so slightly into the 21st century.
It isn't just the offense that made the change, though. Saban recognized that he needed to coach differently to combat offenses that put more of a focus on pace.
"I think it's more difficult to coach defensive players in practice because what do you practice?" Saban asked on Friday. "Do you practice the fundamentals or do you practice the pace of play? Until recently we always emphasized the fundamentals. We didn't play very well when the pace of play was faster. This year we tried to put more emphasis on pace of play."
It has worked.
While Alabama's defense has given up the most yards per game (312.4) since Saban's first in Tuscaloosa, its 4.68 yards per play average is better than last year's squad, and the ability to practice against it has paid off.
"These plays we see now, there is a lot of space created from horizontal and vertical, all right, which is going to stress the defensive player athletically to be able to make the play in space," he said on Friday.
This Ohio State team has its work cut out for it in the Allstate Sugar Bowl on New Year's night, because Alabama is hitting its stride at the right time.
The offense now gets a full allotment of 15 bowl practices to expand on the success of the season which, for the most part, was tweaked and tinkered with on the fly while the Crimson Tide prepared for opponents week after week.
On top of that, the last two times we saw Buckeyes coach Urban Meyer square off with Saban, his Florida Gators lost twice by a combined score of 63-19. One of those games, the 32-13 shellacking in the 2009 SEC Championship Game, was the last time the Crimson Tide was an underdog, according to Lance Taylor of WJOX in Birmingham.
Sure, new Buckeyes quarterback Cardale Jones led his team to the Big Ten championship in his first start. But he only threw 17 passes, relied heavily on running back Ezekiel Elliott (not the worst idea in the world) and didn't see anything like the pressure Alabama can generate in the 59-0 win over Wisconsin.
Ohio State is playing its best football right now, which is a major compliment considering its already lost two Heisman Trophy candidates at quarterback.
Alabama is still climbing up that peak with a full roster that has more 4-star and 5-star talent to fill the Mercedes Benz Superdome.
On top of that, Saban has been at his best with time to prepare. Since 2007, when he took over the program, the Crimson Tide is 21-7 with more than a week to prepare for a game.
The Crimson Tide has been slowly building all year long. They are playing their best football right now and clearly have room to grow without having to deal with major injuries on the fly.
Good luck, Buckeyes. You're going to need it.
Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a co-host of the CFB Hangover on Bleacher Report Radio (Sundays, 9-11 a.m. ET) on Sirius 93, XM 208.
Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. All stats are courtesy of cfbstats.com, and all recruiting information is courtesy of 247Sports. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.
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