Tide ready to get back to work

TUSCALOOSA | Fundamental brush-ups will begin to give way to Texas-specific preparation this week as the University of Alabama resumes practicing for the BCS National Championship Game.

As has been the case for each of the previous two bowl preparations under coach Nick Saban, UA spent initial bowl practices returning to the basics — blocking, tackling, technique. Beginning today, Alabama will practice on campus through Dec. 31 before traveling to Pasadena on New Year’s Day.

“Doing a lot of the practice type stuff that we would do more in camp when we’re starting to get ready for the first game of the season,” Saban said when bowl practices began.

“I think we’re going to start to focus directly a little more on Texas (this) week,” said offensive guard Barrett Jones. “I think that’s the plan.”

That means the scout team will soon be assembled in which reserve players will be wearing the jersey numbers of Texas starters and giving UA’s first-team as strong a simulation for game conditions as possible.

In fact, Saban said last week that he would entertain the idea of a tightly-controlled scrimmage to simulate game conditions, and in fact may have already conducted it.

“What we have discussed is trying to create as game-like a situation as we can in the spirit of safety for our players and having one situation probably the last practice before we go home (for the holidays), that simulates a lot of the situations and game-like stuff,” Saban said. “Now whether we tackle people to the ground and do things like it’s a real scrimmage – I think the greatest opportunities to get injured is when people are on the ground. We want to try and avoid that, but we also feel like we need to do something that’s very game-like that’s going to help our players take the next step of getting ready for this game.”

The Longhorns are ranked No. 1 in the nation in rush defense, allowing 62.15 yards per game at 1.99 yards per carry. Senior quarterback Colt McCoy, a Heisman Trophy finalist, ranks No. 10 in the nation in total offense at 296 yards per game. McCoy has passed for 3,512 yards on a 70-percent completion rate, but has also picked up 348 net rushing yards - more than 500 discounting losses from sacks.

“Just going on what I’ve seen in previous games on television, the offense goes through Colt McCoy,” said Alabama cornerback Javier Arenas. “So we just have to do a good job of affecting him and limiting his ability to run and trying to get some pressure on him to get the pocket to collapse some, so that he doesn’t have as much time to throw the ball.”

Reach Chase Goodbread at chase.goodbread@tuscaloosanews.com, or at 205-722-0196.