A-Day Postgame Notes and Quotes
4/22/2017 5:56:00 PM | Football
Team Captains
Team captains for the Golden Flake A-Day Game were for the Crimson Team quarterback Jalen Hurts, running back Bo Scarbrough and offensive lineman Bradley Bozeman; for the White linebacker Shaun Dion Hamilton, defensive back Minkah Fitzpatrick and defensive lineman Da'Ron Payne.
Official A-Day Game Attendance
The official estimated attendance at today's game was 74,326 at Bryant-Denny Stadium (capacity: 101,821), the ninth-largest attendance mark for an A-Day football game.
Largest A-Day Attendance Totals
The top attendance totals for Alabama's A-Day Game.
Year...................... Attendance
2011...................... 92,310*
2007...................... 92,138
2010...................... 91,312
2009...................... 84,050
2012...................... 78,526
2013...................... 78,315
2008...................... 78,200
2016...................... 76,212
2017...................... 74,326
2014...................... 73,506
2015...................... 65,175
1988...................... 51,117
1994...................... 46,700
2006...................... 40,000
1995...................... 37,323
2002...................... 37,000
2004...................... 35,000
2001...................... 35,000
*A-Day Record
Former Players in Attendance at A-Day
The Crimson Tide welcomed back a large contingent of former players to Saturday's Golden Flake A-Day Spring Football Game. Among those in attendance: T.J. Yeldon, A'Shawn Robinson, Dont'a Hightower, Jonathan Allen, Reuben Foster, Eddie Jackson, Cam Robinson, Kenyan Drake, Derrick Henry, Mark Ingram, Reggie Ragland, Courtney Upshaw, Dalvin Tomlinson, Justin Woodall, Dillon Lee, Andre Smith, D.J. Pettway, Chavis Williams, Damion Square, Brandon Gibson, Brandon Greene, Chance Warmack, O.J. Howard, Ryan Anderson, Tim Williams, C.J. Mosley, Roman Harper, Jalston Fowler, Jarrick Williams, Jacob Coker, ArDarius Stewart, D.J. Fluker, Glen Coffee and Ha Clinton-Dix.
Spring Football Award Winners
The following Alabama football players were honored for the performance throughout spring football practice with the following awards bestowed by the Crimson Tide coaching staff:
Lee Roy Jordan Headhunter Award – Rashaan Evans, Hale Hentges
Jerry Duncan "I Like to Practice" Award – Keith Holcombe, Jamar King, Irv Smith
Billy Neighbors Defensive Lineman Award – Johnny Dwight, Da'Ron Payne
Paul Crane Offensive Lineman Award – Ross Pierschbacher, Jonah Williams
Bobby Johns Defensive Back Award – Anthony Averett, Ronnie Harrison
Johnny Musso Offensive Back Award – Josh Jacobs
Ray Perkins Receiver Award – Calvin Ridley
Woodrow Lowe Linebacker Award – Anfernee Jennings
Derrick Thomas Community Service Award – Josh Casher, Miller Forristall, JK Scott
Bear Bryant Outstanding Non-Scholarship Award – Bo Grant, Austin Johnson, Donnie Lee, Zavier Mapp, Jacob Parker, Daniel Powell
Ozzie Newsome Most Improved Freshman Award – Raekwon Davis, Trevon Diggs, Terrell Hall, Najee Harris, Dylan Moses, Brian Robinson, Tua Tagovailoa
Bart Starr Most Improved Player Award – Tony Brown, Lester Cotton, Robert Foster, Xavian Marks, TJ Simmons, Quinnen Williams, Matt Womack
Mal Moore Leadership Award – Shaun Dion Hamilton, Jalen Hurts, Bo Scarbrough
Sylvester Croom Commitment to Excellence Award – Bradley Bozeman, Minkah Fitzpatrick
Dwight Stephenson Lineman of the A-Day Game Award – Raekwon Davis
Dixie Howell Memorial Most Valuable Player of the A-Day Game Award – Jerry Jeudy
The Golden Flake A-Day Game Brings an End to Spring Practice
The University of Alabama football team and head coach Nick Saban wrapped up spring practice today with the 2017 Golden Flake A-Day Game at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Alabama opened spring practice on Tuesday, March 21, and held 14 practices through Thursday, April 20, leading up to today's A-Day game. The Crimson Tide also held two scrimmages here at Bryant-Denny Stadium this spring (April 8 and April 14) in preparation for today's game.
Walk of Fame Ceremony Honored 2016 Team Captains
The four permanent team captains from the 2016 season – defensive lineman Jonathan Allen, linebacker Rueben Foster, defensive back Eddie Jackson and offensive lineman Cam Robinson – were recognized at the annual Walk of Fame ceremony that took place Saturday at 12:15 p.m. at Denny Chimes. Per Alabama tradition, all four captains had their hand prints and foot prints placed in cement at the base of Denny Chimes in recognition of the leadership, commitment and excellence in representing the Crimson Tide.
A-Day Game Format
The format for the A-Day game was much like a normal game, with a few minor variations primarily regarding the game clock. The game consisted of four 15-minute quarters with a running clock. The clock stopped only following scoring plays, penalties, and changes of possession. Regular clock rules were used during the final minutes of the second quarter and the fourth quarter. Halftime was 12 minutes in duration. Players wearing black jerseys (quarterbacks and injured players) were considered "tag-off" and were not treated as live players. The kickoffs and kick returns were "tag-off" plays as well, with the ball spotted at the 30-yard line.
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Alabama Head Coach Nick Saban
Opening statement
"It was a fun game for the players and a very competitive game. I like to see guys compete and have fun in a game like this and I certainly felt like, especially with the way it ended, it ended up that way. My assessment of the spring is that I don't think that we're an elite team right now. I think we're kind of an adequate team. I don't mean that in a negative way because I think we've come out of the spring in a lot of years where we don't have an elite team. It's how the team responds through the summer and fall camp because we're going to play an elite team in the first game. What kind of commitment each guy makes to being an elite player, affecting himself in a positive way, and affecting his unit in a positive way is going to determine how we all affect our team in a positive way which ultimately will lead to what kind of team we really have. I think there were a lot of situations in this game today that are great teaching situations. We get the ball first and one on the one yard line, and then an unforced error with a penalty puts us on the seven, and then we throw an interception and we don't score. At the end of the game, the White team had the game won, but they get a targeting foul, which was not necessary. So the other team gets another chance and they take advantage of it, and they kick a field goal to win the game. There's a lot of lessons to be learned from a game management standpoint. It's one of the reasons that I like to have games like this where it's very competitive between the players with the good guys are playing against the good guys and the twos are playing against the twos. I think that a lot of the young players did a good job today. I think they'll gain a lot from the experience that they had, whether it was Tua (Tagovailoa) at quarterback, Jerry Jeudy at wide receiver, Dylan Moses, Najee Harris, or whoever it might have been. I think it was good that we made big plays on offense. I think it's of some concern when you're playing against yourself that at times people are in position to make plays on the ball and didn't make them. We've got to do a better job on defense with the 50/50 ball, where that's going to be an issue with us in the future. A lot of things to work and a lot of things to improve on. There were some things that got exposed today that maybe we didn't see the rest of the spring that will be interesting to see how we can get our players to respond to it. All in all, I think we had a lot of young players make a lot of progress in the spring. I think it's a little more difficult for some of the more experienced guys in spring practice to maintain the mindset and sense of urgency that you'd like for them to, but we'll see how they'll respond to that too in the fall."
On Jerry Jeudy's spring and improvement
"He's improved well, and he had a good day today. You know, we obviously need some young guys to come through for us at receiver. It's not a position where we have a lot of depth. Calvin Ridley is a special player at the position. Robert Foster had a really good spring, but we need some young players like Jerry Jeudy to continue to grow and develop. He made significant progress throughout the spring, and I think it culminated in a pretty productive day for him today."
On the quarterback play and his evaluation of Tua Tagovailoa
"Well, Tua's played well in all the scrimmages. He had two series with the ones where he went three-and-out, so that's not really what we'd like to see. But these statistics are very misleading. First of all, how many times did we run the ball, and what were the rushing yards on the rushing plays? And if you want to get the true stats on the passing yards, take away all the sacks from that because those are all the negative plays that we had because we were passing the ball. There's a lot more balance than what the statistics show because we take the sacks off the rushing yards in college football. There's really no negative plays passing unless you throw an interception. There was a lot of production. I think all of our quarterbacks are better passers than they were a year ago - first, second and third team guys. I think that was encouraging. But it really is not. We'll do the stats when we grade the film because we'll say, 'Okay, we ran the ball 27 times, and we gained 86 yards.' What is that? Three yards a carry? Not good enough. Maybe the other team gained 15 yards on however many, 25 carries, that is good enough. When you take the sacks off of it, you have no way of knowing what your efficiency was when you ran the ball and really what your efficiency is when you threw it. We probably had 10 sacks out there today. Twelve. Twelve total. Each probably averaged seven to 10 yards. Now you have 250 yards passing on both teams. It's a little bit misleading when you look at that part of it, but as I said before it was good that we threw the ball with a little more efficiency and we made some explosive plays in the passing game which I think is very important to being successful on offense."
#15 JK Scott, P
On what goes through his mind when kicking a field goal vs. kicking a punt
"I'm not really thinking about a whole lot. When I take my steps for kicks, I'm just kind of thinking 'Alright, take this step, line up, get it over and give them a nod.' Punting, I'm just ready to go. To be honest, I'm really not thinking anything."
On if he's seen himself improve with the distance in kickoffs
"Yes, definitely. This year especially, I have really trained to work on all three. My kickoffs have been something I worked on and will continue to progress over the summer."
#32 Rashaan Evans, LB
On how big of an influence the spring and summer are
"I feel like the summer is the most important part of the whole season. The team really kind of builds itself and understands what it's going to be like when the season starts."
On his biggest concern on defense
"Really, just finishing. You saw out there, just with the white team itself. We wanted to treat that whole situation like the Clemson game. We came up short, but we went into it strong. It's something we need to work at and focus on in the spring."
