Nick Saban made waves earlier this week when he described the 2021 season as a “rebuilding year” during an interview on WJOX out of Birmingham, Alabama.

On Thursday, following the first practice of fall camp, Saban was asked about the comment, and he doubled down on those remarks.

“I don’t understand what’s so hard to understand,” Saban said. “The point being, we were young, and we should have 9 starters back on offense, and 9 starters back on defense. That’s the point I was trying to make. Six guys went out for the draft, so as we usually have to do, we have lots of rebuilding to do again this season. So that’s the point I was trying to make. So when you have a lot of young players playing, I don’t think our standard is like everybody else’s standard. But when you have a lot of young players playing, you’re actually trying to rebuild, so those guys get the kind of experience you need so those guys are playing at a level you need them to play at so you can play at the standard you want to play to.”