Like it is

Saban is always angling to avoid a 'trap'

Alabama head coach Nick Saban watches pregame warmups before the NCAA college football game against Mississippi, Saturday, Sept. 15, 2018, in Oxford, Miss. (Bruce Newman/The Oxford Eagle via AP)
Alabama head coach Nick Saban watches pregame warmups before the NCAA college football game against Mississippi, Saturday, Sept. 15, 2018, in Oxford, Miss. (Bruce Newman/The Oxford Eagle via AP)

Little tricky Nicky is at it again.

Nick Saban, perhaps the greatest college football coach in history, loves to hate the Alabama media, but if he wants to get a message to his team and the fans of Alabama football he goes straight to the media.

On Monday, Saban said the University of Arkansas game could be a trap game. No, he didn't use a word that rhymes with trap when he angrily explained that wasn't how Bama got players.

What he was saying is Alabama is the greatest program in the country, but it doesn't need to take the Razorbacks -- who haven't won a game since Eastern Illinois -- lightly.

Maybe the oddsmakers are wrong and Alabama shouldn't be a 35½-point favorite. They were wrong last week when they made Texas A&M a 21-point favorite but the Hogs lost by only seven, 24-17.

Of course, this is the same Crimson Tide who stomped the guts out of the Aggies 45-23, and it wasn't as close as the score because Saban went deep into his bench in the second half and the Aggies final touchdown was with less than two minutes to play, probably against a bunch of walk-ons who will cherish those moments for life.

Some are saying this is a good Bama defense but not a great one, and it is allowing an average of 317.6 yards per game -- the Hogs are averaging 348.8 yards per game -- but Alabama has outscored its five opponents by an average of 54-13.

The defense has 18 sacks, 17 additional tackles for loss and 9 interceptions. Those numbers don't bode well for the Razorbacks.

The Tide's numbers are skewed by the fact Saban has called off the dogs in the second half of every game. So far, the Tide's style points have come in the first half.

Consider that Alabama has outscored its five opponents 103-14 in the first quarter, 94-6 in the second quarter and 57-17 in the third quarter, but Bama has been outscored in the fourth quarter 28-17.

That fourth-quarter stat doesn't mean the Razorbacks are going to win if they are within a touchdown going into the final period because Saban won't be substituting down to the end of the bench.

Alabama's offense is scary good. Just think that Jalen Hurts passed for 4,868 yards and ran for 1,809 as a freshman and sophomore combined. He accounted for 61 touchdowns and was 24-2 as a starter.

Tua Tagovailoa came off the bench in the national championship game at the half and pulled off the victory over Georgia, then beat Hurts out in head-to-head competition in the fall.

After five games, Tagovailoa has completed 66 of 88 passes for 1,161 yards and 14 touchdowns, and he's run for 115 yards and 2 touchdowns on 20 carries.

He has not taken a snap in the fourth quarter this season. He sat out the entire second half of the Ole Miss game, and he played one series in the third quarter against Louisville.

He has thrown zero interceptions.

After five games, the true sophomore is one of the favorites to win the Heisman Trophy. Hurts will graduate in December -- just two-and-a-half years since arriving on campus -- and is expected to transfer.

The Alabama offensive line has allowed Tagovailoa to be sacked only once, although he gets part of the credit because he's an elusive athlete.

In other words, the only team that should be able to beat Alabama on Saturday is Alabama. If they don't take care of the ball and play every down, then an improving Razorback team could give the Tide some trouble.

Which is exactly what tricky Nicky meant when he said this could be a trap game.

Sports on 10/03/2018

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