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Official Post Game Thread - Everything Here, Please...

1: Be happy for the Utah kids, their coaches and staff and their fans. The players may have talked some smack during the game but they more than made up for it. Great team and a great effort tonight.

2: I hate Urban Meyer so hard.

3: Yeah, Utah would get my vote if I had one. Why not?

4: When was the last time we lost a Sugar Bowl?

5: I am more than tickled to death to be in a position to lose a Sugar Bowl.

6: Congratulations to our team on a great season. Considering where this program has had to come from and how much it has had to go through, even with the last two losses I'm very happy and very proud of this team and even prouder to be a fan of the Crimson Tide.
 
Bama's offense may be a little too easy to prepare for when a team has 3 to 4 weeks with focus on Bama only. Bama's weaknesses had been exposed a couple of times this year.

Early in the game, Utah had things go their way in the same manner Bama had in some of Bama's wins this season. Bama missed a couple of big passes early, threw the interception, and Utah made some good catches when the receivers were covered fairly well.

Should have thrown to the back more to counter Utah's DL rushing straight in; this worked almost every time.
 
While I am pleased in the year overall, we got beat by a lesser team tonight. Honestly - I've never seen us come out that cold. After we gave up a quick 21 points, we held them to 14 and scored 17 with two near-miss field goals.

We can talk about blaming Andre's agent but what if he had hurt himself in practice this week or in pre-game? We would have had less time to prepare for a shift and would most likely have done worse. Our O-Line needs some serious improvement if one (albeit one AMAZING) guy goes down and we give up SEVEN sacks.

I will say that I am looking forward to improvement at the QB position next year. JPW had to run for his life too often tonight but perhaps he would have been able to force their secondary into different coverage and reduce some of the pressure they put on him if he had looked off a receiver every now and then. He solved a lot of his issues from last year to this - and I give him credit for that - but he didn't seem to be able to kick the habit of locking in on a single target 95% of the time.
 
I do not want to see anyone pinning all of this on Andre Smith, the agent in question, etc. Yes, the loss of Andre hurt a lot more than some thought, and Utah took advantage of that, but Andre also didn't play defense. On one hand, I feel as sick as I did when we lost to ULM. On the other hand, I'm not completely shocked by this loss.

This is what I saw - a team that got punched in the mouth several times, and instead of responding, we played like Clemson and played scared. It was laughable that our O-line got spooked so much by Utah's shifts in the first half, and several Utah plays were extended by two things: 1) lack of a pass rush, which has always been a problem and 2) poor tackling and poor play overall by the secondary. We also had a very young team, and DEPTH once again became an issue, as evidenced by the O-line shuffling and DB play (to me).

This is how I move on - we have talent on the team and coming in recruiting, and a lot of it. The current freshmen will now have to work their butts off in the offseason and I really hope that the losses to Florida and Utah shows how much they, as a team, need to FINISH. For whatever reason, this team has this tendency to not show up for games that are perceived (by anyone, not exclusively by national media or our team) to be "easy" games. There may be some "easy" games, but Utah was senior-laden, where we are a very young team. We can get better, the players can get better conditioned physically and mentally.

I've moved on already. I want to see how the returning guys respond to this in the offseason. The coaches can only prepare these players so much, but the players have to absolutely play with 100% effort on every single play against every single team. If the returning guys want to make a statement next season, this offseason is their chance to do that.
 
Congratulations to Utah on a well-deserved win.

The Utes just hit us in the mouth and didn't let up. Yes, Bama was flat. Yes, there were distractions. But Utah was the better team TONIGHT. They deserve the credit for taking advantage of the opportunities they were given. That's what a good team does. I hate it, but my hat's off to them.

Bama will be back. Hopefully, the team will learn from this. One more step in the process.

Roll Tide Roll!!!
 
runtheoption22 said:
1. 9 seniors. Several of which didn't exactly perform well tonight. I can't wait until we get 25 who've actually been completely Sabanized.

2. Our DBs didn't adjust well to the fast-pace. I hope we see a lot of improvement out of them, and hopefully the freshmen/RS freshmen improve.

3. Davis is not the answer at LT, neither is Johnson. Carpenter, the JUCO signee, or DJ Fluker, true freshman next year, may be our new LT.

4. The lack of a true passing threat killed us in our two losses. Yes, JPW deserves a lot of praise for his improvement, but he was never a threat to beat anyone with his arm.

5. We have to have another WR step up opposite of Julio.

6. I'll bet we see some personnel issues addressed, similar to tonight, to get more pressure on the QB. Upshaw, Anders, and maybe a true freshman or two will find ways into the lineup.
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Good points all.
 
REBELZED said:
Alabama is the better team, but we came out flat as hell and it showed. These are the consequences of playing a non-BCS team in a BCS bowl. Who cares if we beat Utah? They're an undefeated team from a crappy conference.

It's hard for the players to get up for this game as a reward to a 12-0 regular season in the SEC. A game against Utah is the reward for that? Woopty doo. Unfortunately that's the attitude our team had too. Hats off to Utah for taking advantage of us not being ready to play. But you play this game 10 times, Alabama wins 8 or 9. Especially if this game was played in the regular season.

This matchup was a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't game for Alabama. If we win, we're supposed to. If we lose, it's the end of the world. Tonight the world ended. Bad end to 2008, but what can you do? Bring on 2009.
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Get out of denial. The better team DID win. And won convincingly. Give them their due.
 
I don't think Coach Saban had any quit in him did ya'll see him ripping Arenas on that third down conversion. Boy he was hot, wonder what he says to them after the game.
 
runtheoption22 said:
1. 9 seniors. Several of which didn't exactly perform well tonight. I can't wait until we get 25 who've actually been completely Sabanized.

2. Our DBs didn't adjust well to the fast-pace. I hope we see a lot of improvement out of them, and hopefully the freshmen/RS freshmen improve.

3. Davis is not the answer at LT, neither is Johnson. Carpenter, the JUCO signee, or DJ Fluker, true freshman next year, may be our new LT.

4. The lack of a true passing threat killed us in our two losses. Yes, JPW deserves a lot of praise for his improvement, but he was never a threat to beat anyone with his arm.

5. We have to have another WR step up opposite of Julio.

6. I'll bet we see some personnel issues addressed, similar to tonight, to get more pressure on the QB. Upshaw, Anders, and maybe a true freshman or two will find ways into the lineup.
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Thanks, this really grounds me right now, I think he can bring us back, I hope. I think we really got some good breaks, 4 point win over OM, OT over LSwho, Barn and Uthug had bad years. If the staff can just get half the players I was hoping for on NSD in FEB. we will be back. I will wait to see OU play FL to see if we can pull an OU who got the L to Bos. St. a few years back. RTR.
 
GABAMA said:
I don't think Coach Saban had any quit in him did ya'll see him ripping Arenas on that third down conversion. Boy he was hot, wonder what he says to them after the game.
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I will say this.... this Spring and fall, they had pictures in the locker room of the scoreboard at the end of the Louisiana-Monroe game to motivate the players.

If we have to use a loss to an undefeated team (even if it was Utah) in a BCS Bowl as motivation..... we're doing just fine in the big picture....

Bring on National Signing Day.
 
Great year. Look forward to the years to come.
I'm making plans to be in T-Town for A-day for a show of support and appreciation for this program.
 
Thank you Andre Smith for screwing this thing up. Thanks to your bad decisions, you caused or O-LINE to get changed up which caused bad chemistry. Nick walker doesnt know a snap count, and JPW had no time. Im not usually willing to blame one guy, but Andre Smiths absence absolutely screwed everything up.
 
My old high school coach had a saying, "Its all over but the crying now boy's!" We just got beat. An old fashioned beating. Let's take the lesson learned and go back to the weight room and practice field and learn from our mistakes. Pass blocking, rushing the passer and cover the receivers! Come out next year and beat everyone we play and then this game will be forgotten. I remember times in the Army when we would get destroyed by the OPFOR, next time we fought we knew what we did wrong and won in a cake walk. Sometimes a good beating is good for the soul. It causes you to work harder, fight harder and eliminate mistakes. I think that this could be a turning point if we learn from our mistakes. Anyway, Roll Tide! I love this team, loved going to Bama and love being a small part of the program. Roll Tide, and I hope I know that better day's are coming.:BigA:
 
CaliforniaTide said:
I do not want to see anyone pinning all of this on Andre Smith, the agent in question, etc. Yes, the loss of Andre hurt a lot more than some thought, and Utah took advantage of that, but Andre also didn't play defense.
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Our defense did a much better job in the second half, but I agree. However, seeing how many sacks JPW got from that left side emphasizes how HUGE a loss Andre was for us in this game. Had JPW had more time to throw instead of running for his life every play, who knows how things would have gone?
 
I am so proud of what this team accomplished this year and congratulate them on getting this far. This game really showed how far we still have to come though. We don't have a lot of depth and with AS out we had a terrible let down. JPW was running for his life all night and I do not fault him for this game. Not sure why our defense had such a bad game (what am I saying -- there was a major distraction with Steele leaving). Let's pull together for 2009! We have a lot to look forward to.
 
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