Saban Discusses Injury Updates Pre-UK Game

In his second media appearance and final of Kentucky week, Alabama coach Nick Saban spoke Wednesday night on the health of his football team and other topics. Here are some highlights.

Opening Statement

"The most important thing is the players were a little better today after being a little sluggish yesterday.

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"It's tough to play in this league on the road and you have to have the right mindset in terms of how you practice. You have to have the right mental approach. We're making progress.

On injuries to Jaylen Key and Deontae Lawson

"They haven't been able to practice yet. It's still day to day. If they can't practice on Thursday its tpught to play in the game."

On Kadyn Proctor's progress at left tackle

""He's getting better. He's got more confidence. Young guys at any position learn by making mistakes. He's continued to progress and improve."

On run defense

"We'll get tested this week. These guys will run it. We may not have all our defensive guys ready to play. we've got to get the guys we do have ready. We'll see how good we are against the run."

On Kentucky being good at both making and limiting explosive plays

"They play a lot of zone defense and do a good mob matching patterns.

"Offensively they run two man routes with great protection so their receivers can get down field. They do a good job with their play action tying into their run game."

On Curt Cignetti being 9-0 at James Madison

"I'm glad he's doing well. I know they have a really good team. I coached for Frank, Curt's dad, so I'm close to the family. Curt did a great job here [as an assistant]."

On the opening drive struggles this year defensively

"The same thing that goes wrong on anything. Don't execute well. Sometimes they do something you haven't seen on defense. It all comes down to execution.

"Last week we busted a coverage on LSU''s first drive. It's great to start fast and great to finish strong. That's something we're trying to focus on. We probably did a better job of that in this last game than we have all year."