Nick Saban Game Quotations

Nobody in this room, with all of our power and might put together, can have anything to do with where it goes. What we can try to do is have something to do with preparing for the game and doing our job well and having pride in the performance of what we have to do.

Philosophically, they want to establish the run, ... The most important aspect in the game was we stopped the run early.

I don't know that tradition has ever won or lost a game. As far as I can tell, the field they have up there is 53 yards wide and 100 yards deep. They'll play 11. We'll play 11. The game will be decided on who does the best job of blocking and tackling and dominating the guys they play against.

I don't think anybody goes out there not knowing what to do, ... I don't think anybody doesn't know they didn't do it right after it happens. I just think that you are talking about a lot of different multiples and adjustments that have to occur. They happen quickly in the game and I think the more repetition you get on things like that, the more confidence the players gain in their ability to adjust.

But what happened in their first game is no indication of the kind of team that they have.

Gus did well, but he looked more comfortable and confident with the offense because he's played in the system before. I think we were a little tentative early in the game and I think the longer we played, the better we played.

Gus has a good understanding of the offense, he's very knowledgeable. And I think (he) can manage the game the best with a pretty young offensive team right now. . . . We weren't displeased with the job any of the quarterbacks did, but we felt that Gus would give us the best opportunity to be successful.

We looked at him last year, quite a bit. Kelly's a smart, experienced quarterback. He's very capable of managing a game and doing what they need him to do to have success and it will be up to us to execute what we have to, to try to stop it.

Managing the game is the most important thing. Gus has done a pretty good job of that. Turnovers are not killing us. We won the turnover battle in the games that we won and we didn't in the one that we lost.

I think he's going to need to play some. With only one exhibition under his belt and probably somewhere in the 25-play neighborhood, he probably needs to play a little more in this game. The plan in not playing him in the first game was with the idea that he would play in two games in his preparation for the season.

I think that's a great example -- and those players know it who were involved -- that to play a game for 60 minutes, you've got to be disciplined and you never want to have undisciplined, unprovoked penalties like that. My advice is act like you've been there.

I think that he needs to play some, I really do. With only one exhibition game under his belt, he probably needs to play a little bit more in this game.

We have a goal for how many explosive plays that we want to make. We don't want to make those explosive plays at the expense of making poor decisions that are going to turn into turnovers and interceptions. Taking care of the ball and managing the game are more important than that.

We are going to try to get him to be able to come back in the best possible condition and the best game readiness he can be in.

We want to see guys compete so we can know whether they need to be here, we want them to be here and if they are the kind of people we want. The record doesn't really matter, the result doesn't matter and the score in the game doesn't really matter.

We felt like he did a good job in going in and playing significantly in the last game when Jason got hurt. There is nobody disappointed in his performance. That's where you have to be careful about stats. How many opportunities did he have that he didn't make? That would be a better assessment of what he has or hasn't done.

Do we want to play him 75 plays in a game? Probably not, ... Do we want to play him in spots and spurts and see how he responds and reacts to it? It's almost like you would do in a preseason game -- six, eight plays, take him out for a few, put another guy in, give him six or eight more and see how he manages it.

There is somewhat of a difference, although we haven't seen Kelly play that much for them, especially in the regular (season) games, to know there would be a significant difference in game plan other than the fact that they move J.P. around a bit in the pocket.

We are going to effectively try to get him to be able to come back in the best possible condition and the best game readiness he can be in.

We are going to get the quarterback ready that is going to play in the game and we are going to try and get the backup ready to be the backup. It is really insignificant to me, because there are players at every position that get limited amounts of reps to be backups and if something happens to the guy ahead of him, whether they are having trouble performing, they get injured or whatever, that guy has got to get you through the game.

Ronnie did a nice job in the game. I'm sure nobody feels worse about fumbling the ball in the situation at the end of the game than he does and that's something that we'll have to learn and grow from.

We had a chance to stop them at the end of the game and they bang us with a big play right off the bat, ... Those things are disappointing. I was very proud, though, of the way our players fought back in the game.

This game is really about our players and not about me going back to Baton Rouge,

If you don't have an indoor facility, you've got to cut down the practice time in preparation for the game so the players can recover. Or you change the environment they do the work in, which an indoor facility allows you to do. It's really a player health and safety issue as much as anything.

This is kind of the beginning of maybe LSU becoming a dominant program in the future of college football, ... It's not really the end in terms of this game here.

The No. 1 thing is we want somebody who is going to manage the game and give us the best opportunity to be successful. We were going to make the decision based on this position based on who we felt would give us the best opportunity to win, and managing the game is a really important part of that.

It's great to have that kind of tenacity and attitude. But it's also great to have it from the start so you can dominate the game for 60 minutes, which is certainly our goal.

It's important how you respond to good things and bad things. We should enjoy this for 24 hours, but this is one game in a long season.

It's been wonderful. I really do feel like this was coming home to play a game and it was exciting for me even though I didn't say it (earlier). It was exciting to be back in Tiger Stadium and I feel really great that our team did a nice job to make us proud of how they played.

I really tried to make this about our team, coming back here to play, I really do feel this was coming home to play a game and it was exciting for me. It was exciting to be back in Tiger Stadium.

It was great that Ronnie Brown got untracked a little bit. We told him we were going to work him today. As the game wore on, it looked like he got a little better. Maybe that'll be a sign for us in the future.

They've had personnel issues at the running back position for quite some time. They are getting those guys back now and I think those guys are playing better and better. I think they're as healthy as they've been all year. I think that's the key to it. They ran the ball effectively down here. Heath Evans was basically playing tailback. I don't think there is anything wrong with their running game; I just think that they haven't had all the players available in all the right spots being healthy this year that can help them develop the running game more quickly, but it's certainly developing nicely now.

It was a heavyweight fight. A real street fight. Both teams competed their hearts out. It was about as physical a game as I've seen in a long time.

It was a close call. You don't want the game to come down to that situation if you're playing like you're supposed to for the 60 minutes in the game. Secondly, we need to be (holding) the ball so it's not close.

The entire defensive team made plays. We pressured just about every down, except for that screen pass. We knew we'd have to play them man to man. Their passing game is very well constructed and it's hard to execute zone against it. We thought that we would try to confuse their offensive line.

You don't have to make all of the plays as a quarterback. You have to run the offense. That is what we need to get out of our quarterback... game management.

This is a great football game against a very good football team. A lot of character, a lot of heart out there today on both sides of the ball -- that's what makes it special, when you can persevere and come away with the win.

It's the trademark of both guys in terms of their endurance and ability to get better as the game goes on. That's something we'd like to continue to utilize in the future if we can.

The number-one thing is we want somebody who is going to manage the game and give us the best opportunity to be successful. We were going to make the decision based on this position based on who we felt would give us the best opportunity to win, and managing the game is a really important part of that.

This was probably Ricky's best overall game out there, in terms of him having some space to work in, not only as a runner, but a couple of times as a receiver as well.

We want to pick the quarterback that's going to give us the best opportunity to win. I'm not prepared after watching that game to make a statement about that.

We just want to continue to be able to let them develop and progress. We're not disappointed in anybody. We're actually encouraged by our ability to throw the ball with consistency in the game by all the quarterbacks.

It's going to be a little bit of a process for us to get used to what's best for us to do offensively with those two guys in the game. . . and for those two guys in the game to get used to doing what their roles are, relative to that circumstance which we will continue to try to develop to some degree in the future.

I am assuming that every game that we play in our division is pretty significant in terms of the kind of rivalry it represents, ... All of the lectures that I give are about thinking about this game this week and not the history of the series, who won in 1947 ... whether we go to Niagara Falls ... because all of that stuff doesn't matter.