Nick Saban describes what Alabama football must do to avoid 'creating a monster' vs LSU

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Former Alabama football coach Nick Saban has been in a similar situation against LSU as the one facing Kalen DeBoer when the Tigers visit Bryant-Denny Stadium Saturday night.

The Crimson Tide (7-1 overall, 5-0 SEC), ranked No. 4 in the US LBM Coaches Poll and initial College Football Playoff rankings, are going up against a Tigers (5-3, 2-3) team that’s in the middle of a disappointing season and coming off a loss, 49-25 to Texas A&M in its last game.

LSU fired head coach Brian Kelly and named Frank Wilson interim coach. One of Saban’s last games vs. LSU came against a Tigers team in a similar spot. When Alabama faced the Bayou Bengals in November 2021, LSU had already made the decision that coach Ed Orgeron would not return the following year.

Alabama was a heavy favorite, but the Tide were held scoreless until the final three minutes of the first half, and then had to hold on for a narrow 20-14 victory that came down to the game’s final play on Nov. 6, 2021.

LSU and Orgeron had nothing to lose that night in Tuscaloosa, and the Tigers and their interim coach won’t have anything to lose when they face Alabama Saturday night, either. LSU is still LSU, whether the Tigers are 5-3 or 4-4 as they were at this point four years ago.

On Friday’s edition of “The Pat McAfee Show” on ESPN, Saban called Alabama’s matchup against the Tigers a “very scary situation.”

“I think it’s a very scary situation because it’s very unknown to them. How is LSU’s team going to react to this? What changes are they going to make? The players have nothing to lose, so are they going to play free and easy and just go out and try to play the best football that they can? And they probably feel a little disrespected — I’m talking about LSU — relative to where they are in their season, how its gone, their coach getting fired. It will be interesting to see how they respond.” –Nick Saban on “The Pat McAfee Show.”

For Saban, Alabama can’t afford not to play its best.

“This is not a game that Alabama cannot not go out and play their best game of the year. To me, LSU has a great secondary. Alabama’s dependent on the forward pass quite a bit this year with the receivers they have and the quarterback. Their inability to create a consistency in the running game makes this a pretty good matchup for LSU and their defense versus Alabama’s offense.”

“It’s going to be a really interesting game to see how LSU’s team responds,” Saban added.

What Alabama needs to do to avoid ‘creating a monster’ against LSU

Saban agreed with McAfee that Alabama needed to get ahead of LSU early. The longer the Tigers hang around, McAfee said, the more dangerous things can get.

Saban surmised:

“I would assume that when you’re playing a game like this, if I were the coach, I would tell our guys that we’re going to have to play through the initial great enthusiasm that they’re going to come out with to try to prove something, and you’re going to have to change the way they think. You need to do that by getting off to a great start and not let them stay in the game.”

“Because if they can stay in the game and think they have a chance to win, you’re creating a monster,” Saban concluded.

Kickoff for Alabama-LSU is 6:30 p.m. CT Saturday. The game will be televised on ABC.

Alabama football schedule 2025

All start times Central.

  • Aug. 30: at Florida State (L, 31-17)
  • Sept. 6: vs. UL Monroe (W, 73-0)
  • Sept. 13: vs. Wisconsin (W, 38-14)
  • Sept. 27: at Georgia (W, 24-21)
  • Oct. 4: vs. Vanderbilt (W, 30-14)
  • Oct. 11: at Missouri (W, 27-24)
  • Oct. 18: vs. Tennessee (W, 37-20)
  • Oct. 25: at South Carolina (W, 29-22)
  • Nov. 8: vs. LSU, 6:30 p.m., ABC
  • Nov. 15: vs. Oklahoma, 2:30 p.m., ABC
  • Nov. 22 vs. Eastern Illinois, 1 p.m., ESPN+
  • Nov. 29: at Auburn, TBA

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This article originally appeared on Roll Tide Wire: Alabama football faces ‘scary situation’ vs LSU, Nick Saban says

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