Rebuilding After Success Again the Challenge for Alabama Football

Less than four weeks away from the Crimson Tide's season opener against Miami in Atlanta, Bill O'Brien and Pete Golding are both optimistic about the team's preparations thus far.

At the 2021 SEC Football Media Days, one of the most-written pieces of dialogue from Alabama head coach Nick Saban’s segment of the conference concerned the rebuilding of the program after its success in 2020.

"The penalty for success when you win a national championship is you won because you had a whole lot of good players," Saban said back in July. "They were well coached, so you had a lot of good coaches. When you lose some of those players, and we lost six first-round draft picks and ten guys overall in the draft, and you lose some of those coaches to better opportunities, the challenge is you've got to rebuild with a lot of new players who will be younger, have new roles, less experience, and how do they respond to these new roles?

"That's why rebuilding is a tremendous challenge. That's why it's very difficult to repeat."

Last Friday, Alabama opened fall camp and officially began preseason preparations. After a 2020 season that saw the Crimson Tide win its 18th national title, the program is now having to rebuild quite a lot of its offense; an offense that was the primary key to its success.

In total, Alabama lost eight starters from the offensive side of the football, including starting quarterback Mac Jones, Heisman Trophy winner DeVonta Smith, talented wide receiver Jaylen Waddle, versatile running back Najee Harris and three Joe Moore Award-winning offensive linemen. On defense, the Crimson Tide only loses two starters, but linebacker Dylan Moses, defensive back Patrick Surtain were two of its most experienced veterans.

Saban is very well aware of the challenges that his program is facing this season. In addition to losing so many players, Alabama will no doubt have a target painted on its back. In fact, the head coach had former MLB infielder Alex Rodriguez speak to the team last week regarding the difficulties of repeating titles.

The awareness of the situation has trickled down to his assistant coaches. On Sunday at the Crimson Tide’s Media Day, the theme of rebuilding after success was once again a recurring element.

“Every year’s different,” first-year offensive coordinator Bill O’Brien said. “I think in the end, it comes down to who your players are, what can they do best, who your quarterback is, what can he do best and what’s best for the team. So no year is like any other year, so this year will be very different than any other year, and that’s just the way it is in football. That’s the way it’s always been in my career. And these guys are working hard every single day to try to improve.”

While Alabama’s offense has a lot more key elements to replace — certainly no small challenge for O’Brien during his first year — the defense is in a much better situation. While it is having to replace two veterans, the Crimson Tide is loaded with talent and expectations for its defense are higher than they’ve been for quite some time.

The level of returning talent was something that defensive coordinator Pete Golding repeatedly mentioned on Sunday. At the same time, though, he reiterated that last season is over, and a new one has begun.

“We have plenty of talent,” Golding said. “I think we have more depth that we’ve had – we’ve got to continue to develop that. But that daily focus and that mindset that prevents poor performance. I’m going to get out what I put in. I think that’s the biggest thing right now. Last year they did a great job, they got better. But it’s over. We’ve got to move on. We’ve got enough talent, but we’ve got to put the work in.”

Alabama football is now two practices deep into fall camp, with 23 more separating it and its season opener against Miami in Atlanta. Over those two days, players began to shake off the rust and practiced in helmets and jerseys during drills. However, despite being only two days in, both coordinators had a lot to say about the effort of their players.

Weeks away from starters being named, and O’Brien is impressed with the level of effort displayed by his offense. With eight new starters having to emerge over the next several weeks, O’Brien noted how hard each player is working to prepare for this season.

“At this point, I would say we obviously have a long way to go,” O’Brien said. “You can tell this team put a lot of work into the offseason. I just really have been very impressed with their attitude and work ethic. The leadership has been good. Whether it’s the returning players or some of the guys that were back up players last year or the incoming freshman, these guys work really hard. It’s really been a joy to coach these guys through the winter conditioning program, spring practice and now into training camp.”

Last season, Alabama — along with every other college football program in the country — was unable to conduct spring practice due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This year, however, was a different story. The Crimson Tide was able to fully host its spring season along with the annual A-Day Game.

Golding believes that having a spring season in addition to a full 25-session slate of fall camp practices will go a long way toward preparing his defense for a run at repeating as national champions.

“I think that’s kind of the big difference from last year at this point for these young players on defense is that most of these guys had a spring,” Golding said. “I think that’s big. I think it’s one thing to install on Zoom, slowing that down, from a mental standpoint. But most of these guys are kinesthetic learners; they’ve got to be able to go out and do it. So having those 15 days of spring ball and getting those young guys in December is a huge advantage for us.”

Being just two days into fall camp, it’s difficult to gauge where exactly the team stands. However, according to Saban and his two coordinators, the team is already well on its way to defending its 2020 title. There are certainly questions on the team — particularly on the offensive side of the game — but the optimism displayed by the coaching trio in the face of a returning 12-game schedule should be comforting to Crimson Tide fans.

No doubt, there’s still a long way to go. For now, Alabama will have to address each day practice by practice.

“Just really excited about today’s meetings, tomorrow’s practice and just taking it one day at a time and trying to do the best we can to do our part offensively to have a really good football team here at the University of Alabama,” O’Brien said.