Alabama football: Oklahoma QB Kyler Murray earns respect, but Tide earn spot in national title game
By Marq Burnett
Published:
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Quinnen Williams was ready to finish his sentence on Saturday night.
In a viral clip from Alabama’s media day on Thursday, Williams was asked if he’d gone against any quarterback that resembles Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray.
Williams uttered “I feel like Kyler Murray is not what everybody,” before trailing off and clearing his throat. When the reporter followed up with “what’s that?” Williams said
“Nah, I’m good.” It was a perfect representation of a person’s brain slamming on the brakes.
Williams said that Alabama players are trained to focus on the game without giving too many opinions and straying away from the facts. So, when he felt himself straying too far from the facts, he clammed up.
With the game over and Alabama securing a 45-34 victory over the Sooners in the Orange Bowl, Williams didn’t have to stop himself. So, Kyler Murray is? “Great,” Williams said laughing. He also said Murray was “inside the park home run fast.”
“He definitely is like everybody say he is,” Williams said. “He’s super fast. I learned that today, and our defense learned that. When he (broke) away, he (broke) away quick. I got a lot of hurries on him, but a lot of them would have been sacks if he wasn’t that fast.”
Murray did enough to earn the full respect of Alabama’s players despite the losing effort.
The consensus from Alabama’s players was that Murray was a great player. Murray did his best to keep the Sooners in the game, throwing for 308 yards and 2 touchdowns while rushing for 109 yards and another score.
“He’s elusive, he’s quick and he’s what everybody said he is,” Isaiah Buggs said. “But we did a good job containing him. He wasn’t able to get loose and get free like he wanted to, so that’s why we came out on top.”
But the Sooners essentially lost the game in the first 17 minutes of play as Alabama built a 28-0 lead. Alabama’s entire game plan was built around slowing down Murray, and for the opening quarter, it looked like the Sooners had no answers. Oklahoma, which featured the nation’s top scoring offense heading into the game, had 24 total yards and 0 points in the opening quarter. It’s as if someone forgot to tell the Sooners when they actually needed to start playing.
Alabama safety Deionte Thompson nearly intercepted one of Murray’s passes, and also made a nice open field tackle on the Heisman Trophy winner. But Murray got the better of Thompson and fellow safety Xavier McKinney on a 49-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter.
“I have a ton of respect for him,” Thompson said. “He’s a helluva player, and he displayed why he won the Heisman. He just extends plays like no other guy in the country can. He extended plays from anywhere from five to eight seconds at times. Him being able to sit back there in the pocket, look down the field and get guys open kind of hurt us in the end.”
Veteran Alabama beat reporter Marq Burnett covers the Crimson Tide for Saturday Down South.
