Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin met with the media at his weekly football press conference inside Kyle Field, and talked a little about this week’s game at Alabama (3:30 p.m. ET, CBS):
You talked after your Arkansas game how it was physically a difficult game for your team, do you see Alabama maybe dealing with the same thing going into this week?
“I don’t know, that’s kind of how Alabama is built. They’re used to knocking people around and beating them up. It was a heck of a game, not very much unlike our game with them. It was close all the way down to the end. They were on the road, and they pulled it out. It was a very, very physical game for them. But Alabama is very physical too.”
Talk about Alabama’s approach offensively and how you’ll have to defend them…
“Just this morning I was watching last year’s game and got two quarters into it and it looks nothing like what we’ve seen from them the last few weeks. They’re a different team offensively. Their quarterback is completing at almost 70 percent. Blake Sims gives them an added dimension they haven’t had in the fact he can move around. AJ (McCarron) will probably be upset I said that (laughing). I’m not saying (Blake) is a scrambler for yardage all the time, but what he has been able to do is avoid taking sacks. He moves around back there and creates plays with his movement. They are a big, physical unit up front. They have big backs and guys that can run it at you. On the perimeter, the numbers for their receivers speak for themselves. We’ve got to be able again to be able to play good run defense and eliminate explosive plays. We have gotten better at that. We’ve given up not as many explosive plays, but certainly we’re going to have to limit Alabama’s explosives and still be better against the run.”
Talk about handling adversity and the team’s confidence level…
“It’s something we talk about all the time as a team, expectations and whether you’re winning or losing, and the ability to trust the things within the building, the things within the room. An old coach told me, ‘You start listening to everybody else, you ain’t never been that good and you ain’t never been that bad’. You try and keep an even keel and be honest with where you are. Coming into this thing, nobody said this would be easy. This is a difficult league. There’s no doubt based on the last two weeks that we have to coach better and we have to play better. That’s our expectation within the building, to win games. Confidence I think is something that you don’t gather overnight and I don’t think you lose it overnight. It’s something you build and that’s who you are. And I don’t see that waning.”
Going into this game do you see any similarities to the game two years ago, and how much a win could spark this team?
“I don’t know there are any similarities. We’ve had two great football games, games that really went down to the last play. We won one and lost one. Going back over there, it’s a great atmosphere, a great crowd, a loud place. They’ve got a tremendous amount of pride in their program and they should, with the number of national championships and the number of wins. You get over there and you play the game. I don’t know that I have one particular memory that stands out, except I was able to leave with a smile on my face.”
How much will you rely on the veterans who won there two years ago this week?
“Winning helps everything. We’re going to rely on guys to help us in that atmosphere. We don’t have a bunch of them. If you look back at that game, on the perimeter you have Malcome Kennedy. Defensively, there weren’t a lot of those guys playing in that game. Howard Matthews had a big game a few years ago. Deshazor (Everett) had the big play. But a lot of those guys playing on our defensive front weren’t there. Fortunately, they’ve been in these games…we’re down the road in this season and they’ve played a lot of football. We’ve been on the road quite a bit. We’re going to lean on those guys but we have to have our younger players compete at a higher level. With these games we’re playing, everyone has to play and play well for us to be successful.”
What needs to happen to run your offense consistently?
“I would say in order to be consistent we need to be able to run the ball efficiently. Does that mean we rush for 200 or 300 yards? I don’t think that’s the case. We weren’t efficient the other night. You can’t be if you’re rushing for 1.5 yards a carry. When you’re up to 4 to 5 yards a carry, that’s different. That puts pressure on defenses to have to change. That’s an area we have to improve, our run game efficiency.”
Christopher Walsh has covered Alabama football since 2004 and is the author of 19 books. In his free time, he writes about college football.
