Someone has to take the first snap at quarterback for the University of Alabama.

If Nick Saban has any clue who that player is, he’s not giving the media — and certainly not No. 20 Wisconsin — any strong hints.

When Alabama released its depth chart Monday, it included five scholarship quarterbacks, all separated by a slash. The Crimson Tide is maintaining publicly that David Cornwell and Blake Barnett remain part of the competition while also acknowledging that those two players will not get as many practice reps this week.

Saban was cryptic when asked whether the Tide may play two quarterbacks against the Badgers.

“I don’t remember saying we’re going to play multiple quarterbacks, I don’t know where that came from exactly. Maybe I did say it,” Saban said, according to AL.com. “But there’s been a lot of people have success playing two quarterbacks, especially if they have a different style, which a couple of our guys do have a different style.”

Multiple reports have indicated that was the plan entering the 2014 season opener against West Virginia. Last year, Blake Sims earned an edge on Jake Coker with his superior performance in Alabama’s second preseason scrimmage. But many figured Coker eventually would claim the job. Saban even indicated that there was a plan for Coker to play against the Mountaineers.

But Sims completed 24-for-33 for 250 yards in a 33-23 victory against West Virginia, playing every meaningful snap. Essentially, he became the starting quarterback with that performance. Coker played the fourth quarter the following week against Florida Atlantic and then rarely saw the field the rest of the season, throwing double-digit passes once more (against FCS team Western Carolina).

Perhaps Coker will replicate Sims’ path in 2015.

ESPN’s College GameDay is visiting Arlington, Texas, for a reason. Alabama-Wisconsin matches two preseason Top 20 programs. ABC will televise the game to a national audience.

Alabama is 8-0 in season openers with Saban as coach, winning all eight by double digits. That includes three contests against Top 10 programs. The Tide is supposed to win these games against the Wisconsins of college football, and look impressive doing so.

As a 10-point favorite entering Saturday’s game, according to almost every sports book on the Las Vegas strip, oddsmakers expect Bama to hold Wisconsin to about 20 points. That may be generous in favor of the Badgers.

Alabama’s front seven is brutal this year. Wisconsin lost Heisman Trophy finalist Melvin Gordon at running back as well as three starting offensive linemen. And quarterback Joel Stave and the Badgers receivers are not well-suited to attack the Tide vertically.

In other words, the quarterback who starts the game, if he performs well, should have every opportunity to lead Alabama to a win by double digits against a team ranked well inside the Top 25.

Whatever name performs best — whether it’s as the starter or as the backup entering Saturday — essentially gets one week to cement himself in the role. Alabama hosts Middle Tennessee State on Sept. 12 before the Ole Miss Rebels head to Tuscaloosa in what should be a huge contest.

The quarterback position surely will be settled by then, or else the Tide may have a difficult time meeting expectations as the media’s SEC West favorite.

Coker, a senior transfer, has been the one constant in Alabama’s quarterback discussion. The other four names have flitted in and out of the media spotlight from one day to the next, as Saban’s words about the position get parsed to an extreme degree. But even as a foot injury forced him to miss a few days of preseason practice, Coker never fell off the top line of the competition.

As of today, the other two competitors are Cooper Bateman and Alec Morris.

Saban has said Bateman, an athletic 6-foot-3 and 220 pounds, has improved tremendously as a passer since spring practice. At times, Alabama has positioned him with the tight ends and receivers in practice. That didn’t sound promising for his chances at becoming the Tide’s starting quarterback. But Sims practiced at running back early in his Alabama career, and that didn’t seem to stop him in 2014.

In fact, if there’s a Sims facsimile in the competition, it’s Bateman. He’d be more effective than Coker and Morris executing the “run” part of the run/pass option plays coordinator Lane Kiffin installed with such success in 2014. Much of that success can be credited to Sims’ athleticism.

Like Sims, Morris has been a career backup at Alabama, including a few years behind AJ McCarron as a redshirt and then a redshirt freshman (2012-13). The Allen, Texas, native, based on Saban’s own narrative and other reports out of Tuscaloosa, perhaps has the greatest command of the offense and the huddle. He’s now a redshirt junior, a member of Alabama’s football team going on four years.

That’s more than any other Tide quarterback, and a big reason why he remains in the competition. If Alabama decides the most important factor is leadership ability and the potential to command the offense, — which Saban has alluded to so often — the advantage goes to Morris.

Perhaps Saban, Kiffin and the Alabama staff have it figured out. Perhaps one of these quarterbacks will separate himself from the group in the few practices that remain before opening kickoff.

More likely, though, the play of whomever starts the game against Wisconsin will dictate if another guy gets a chance, or if he’ll lock down the job and never relinquish it in 2015.

Circling back to that first snap: will Coker finally become the player that everyone imagined when Florida State coach Jimbo Fisher spoke of the transfer in such glowing terms last summer?

If a No. 14 jersey isn’t lining up behind center Ryan Kelly sometime after 8 p.m. ET on Saturday evening at AT&T Stadium, expect the word “bust” to show up in your Twitter feed a few times. If he does start and play well, expect more than a few sighs of relief among the Crimson Tide faithful.