Alabama fans will experience some changes in Saturday’s A-Day exhibition at Bryant-Denny Stadium.
Some aspects have remained the same from the Nick Saban era, but Kalen DeBoer has a few alterations.
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He shared one after Friday’s practice with Crimson Tide reporters. Alabama split its roster between White (first-team offense, second-team defense) and Crimson (second-team offense, first-team defense) during its tenure under Saban. This tradition won’t be in effect this weekend as DeBoer will have just ‘offense versus defense.’ Tide will have to get acquainted with this change.
“We will not have divided teams,” DeBoer said Friday.
“A couple reasons for that. …. No. 1, I like to look at it as practice No. 15. We will see a lot of great scrimmaging out there. It is a chance for us to get better. It is a chance for us to take the next step, a chance for us to evaluate as well, and try to get down to the bare bones of playing football. It also gives us a chance to celebrate what we are doing, where we are at, and enjoy the moment with the fans. We are excited to see a packed stadium and looking forward to seeing everyone come and support our program.”
Alabama fans and media members grew accustomed to getting an A-Day roster the Friday before a spring game.
It became a fabric of the spring game to see the players on both rosters, but we are in a new era now.
People are interested in seeing how will the Tide flow without Saban as the head man. Alabama witnessed six national championships under Saban and several entertaining A-Day games that produced marquee stars.
DeBoer is about winning his way, and we’ll see how it works.
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Stephen M. Smith is the senior writer for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. You can “like” him on Facebook or “follow” him on Twitter, via @CoachingMSmith.
